#...probably view the whole assassination as a fantasy come true

[no-naem]

Marcy Wu and Yuzuki Fuwa would get along SO well. 

[theravennest]

Let’s Talk About Shang Chi...

I just got back from seeing Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings. I had a great time with it. Just a lovely experience.

The fights were dope. The music was rocking. The actors’ performances really sold me on everything. I loved all the Xianxia elements. Y’all know fantasy worlds are my JAM!

But it was the characters that really drew me in. Every one of them were pitch perfect for me. The final act got a little jumbled, imo, but the characters and their dynamics were so good that it was enough for me to completely forgive and overlook the somewhat messy final battle. 

The story had a lot of heart. It was so personal and so anchored in real emotions. I highkey fell in love with all the main characters. I love their journeys and their complex  and grounded relationships with each other. I really liked the movie’s examination of grief, loss, and pain and the lengths people will go to in the wake of being overwhelmed by those feelings.

Let’s dig into it! This is gonna be a whole discombobulated mess, I just know it. lmao

***Spoilers below the cut!***

I really felt for Shang Chi, Xialing, and Wenwu struggling to figure out how to be a family again after they were all broken in different ways by the loss of Mama Ying Li. And each one of them trying in their own way to heal from it, some to extremely destructive degrees. 

How Wenwu treated his kids after being consumed by grief and violence was so utterly messed up but in two completely different ways. 

He treated Xialing like she was anathema, like she was literally nothing. Even when they were older and she had grown into an adult, he barely spoke to her in the entirety of the movie, could hardly even look at her. Partially because she looked like her mom and he retreated utterly from the pain of that, and partially because he constantly underestimated her in favor of her brother. This, of course, seeded the resentful tension between Xialing and Shang Chi from the start.

I’m a real sucker for sibling dynamics, as you all know. They’re my favorite types of family-oriented stories. (Side note, I really love the way the MCU has dedicated several stories to sibling relationships. It’s like my favorite thing in the MCU as a whole.)

I completely ate up the harsh and tricky relationship between Xialing and Shang Chi. Shang Chi completely let her down when they were kids, for her POV. (Not really his fault, he was a scared and traumatized 15 year old. Totally understandable.) But there is something to be said about the fact that she was also a child. A child dealing with her mom’s death too AND her dad’s aloofness. Then she was utterly abandoned by her brother. It’s no wonder she never quite forgives him, even though they mostly team up in the movie. They still have a lot to work out between them.

I really loved that she took on leadership of the Ten Rings at the end. The moment Shang Chi said she was “dismantling” their dad’s empire, I knew what was up. Though, the softy in me does hope that eventually they can find true reconciliation between them. I’m excited to see what we’ll see from her in future movies as a potential enemy of Shang Chi. It’ll be really interesting to see how Shang Chi tackles having to go up against his little sister.

And Shang Chi!!! OMG! Let’s talk Shang Chi and Wenwu now. When Wenwu drop kicked him into the ground and started the blame game for Mama Ying Li’s death like bro!!! I was so heated. He was 7 years old. A whole baby! She died because your thousand years of violence and conquering shit finally came home to roost. 

But that one line when Wenwu said Shang Chi’s 7 year old self “just stood there and watched” while his mom was killed actually revealed so much about Wenwu’s character. (The cutting way Tony Leung, a literal legend, delivered that was masterful, btw.) 

I actually think that it was the first time Wenwu has ever verbalized that he blamed Shang Chi for Ying Li’s death. Like maybe he’s always felt that way and all this time he was partially punishing Shang Chi for what he thinks of as a failure to protect or help the woman who meant so much to them.

Like, yes, he was training Shang Chi to take his place with him in the Ten Rings as an assassin but maybe he also wanted Shang Chi to kill his mom’s murderer as penance for letting her die in the first place.

Of course, it’s clear to see that Wenwu was absolutely shifting his own feelings of conflicting guilt onto his kids. Guilt that his past as a warlord is what got her killed. But also guilt that he put down the Ten Rings in the first place when if he had stayed a warlord, this never would have happened. But also the bone deep knowledge that if he hadn’t put down the Rings, Ying Li might never have stayed with him and loved him in the first place.

When Shang Chi threw it back at him that Ying Li probably wouldn’t love the person Wenwu had returned to, Wenwu looked so shook up. Phew! Perfect emoting from Tony Leung in that moment.

Honestly, Wenwu was having a very tragic and confusing time of it in this movie. Which is probably how that creature from beyond was able to find a crack in his psychic defenses and lure him to the gate. I had a lot of empathy for him even though I disagree so much with what he did to his kids, emotionally.

I really respect the fact that the movie never lost that sense of compassion for all of their feelings including Wenwu. I also respect that the movie really gave them space to grieve not just the loss of Ying Li but also the resulting dissolution of their happy family.

It’s just too bad that Wenwu’s grief made him push his kids away instead of pulling them closer. He completely emotionally abandoned them. A thousand years of power and supremacy yet he was broken because he never in that time fully learned how to process his emotions in a healthier way and his kids paid the price. They could’ve leaned on each other and on the love they found with Ying Li to help them get through but alas that’s the tragedy of the movie. 

I really wanted somehow for Shang Chi to make it through to his dad before he went too far to come back again. I genuinely did not want to see Wenwu die at the end. I wanted him to live and see Shang Chi’s changing dynamic with his father continue. I wanted to see him finally acknowledge his daughter as his true heir and see her accomplishments (dark though they will likely become considering the “softer” version of her is the one that ran an illegal fight club in Macao lmao).

Though I am happy Shang Chi got through to him enough at the end for Wenwu to save Shang Chi’s life, willingly pass the rings onto his son, and somewhat accept his own death after a thousand years of life. That was such a poignant moment between them. And I wonder if in that instant, Wenwu had the thought that in dying he’d at least see Ying Li again.

(Side note: I really hope his soul and the souls of everyone that got eaten were freed when Shang Chi killed the monster. I really want them to be able to move on to the next phase of existence. I really hope they weren’t destroyed after being eaten. I want Wenwu to reunite with Ying Li even in the afterlife, gotdamnit! Sue me, I’m a romantic.)

Let’s talk Simu Liu’s performance here for one second. He was incredible throughout. I completely bought into this strange but so real feeling that while he has a lot of anger towards his father, so much hurt, he also felt a lot of heartache and love for who Shang Chi wanted him to be. And the strange desire to want to help a man who emotionally scarred him so badly.

Simu really brought both sides of Shang Chi’s journey to life. Like, he was tying to find his own path, reconcile with the mistakes he’s made in the past (his sister, killing his mom’s murderer), and facing up against his father’s ideals and expectations. But there was also a side of Shang Chi’s journey that was about finally understand both his sister and his father’s point of views, and of learning/embracing his mother’s history. 

That moment by the lake when he revealed to Katy that he had actually killed the man who killed his mother. Whew boy! The emotions were so poignant. Simu Liu played it like *chef’s kiss* beautiful.

Speaking of character choices, I really rate this decision to have him actually go through with the assassination. It puts Shang Chi in an interesting position emotionally and somewhat morally. Instead of having his breaking point be him unable to kill as his father wishes, it’s instead the feeling of guilt and shame that he actually did kill the man.

I wonder if he felt a sense of satisfaction before the disgust and shame settled in. Because Shang Chi literally watched his mom die, he probably initially wanted to help his father hunt down the man because of that bit of dark need for vengeance. Until he got it, and felt ashamed to fully face his mother’s memory afterwards.

I’m interested to see how future Shang Chi movies and Simu will dig into and unpack that little bit of darkness these events instilled in the character.

Let’s talk Ying Li for a second here. This woman was incredible. An incredible martial artist, for sure, a mystical guardian and warrior...but she was also just an incredible person in general. Mama Ying Li was so self-assured, so steadfast in her convictions. She struck me as someone who knows exactly what she wants and is never afraid to reach for it.

Fala Chen portrayed her with such grace, warmth, and strength of character. It was extremely easy to see why Wenwu fell in love with her. She met Wenwu, a literal thousand year old warlord, and through shear strength of character led him to put down his weapons and his empire to make a home with her.

This man threw away his entire shadow army of assassins, threw away his whole plan to literally demolish her village in the pursuit of power...in order to play Dance Dance Revolution with her and their kids. (The highlight of their romance and the family flashbacks, for me, tbh.) 

And I know it’s not necessarily...positive BUT there is something...hmmmm, crunchy in the fact that Ying Li so completely altered Wenwu’s life by simply loving him that when she died he was willing to raze the whole world to get her back, damn the consequences.

Trying to properly explore toxic and negative turns in previously loving family dynamics is such a difficult task to take on. I really liked the complexity of the Xu family. All the actors really sold the family side of things. It was an almost tangible thing how much you could see how the love they felt had turned bitter and painful over the years.

The final battle was epic and mind blowing (There was a fucking DRAGON flying around for gods’ sake!) but I do wish it had stayed a little more grounded for longer in the beginning of it when the Ten Rings were fighting the Ta Lo warriors. I wanted to see more of that fight before they had the turn to becoming temporary allies against the soul suckers. It became a little too much of a CGI mash, for me, in some parts of it.

Still, the emotional beats held and the core of the story of this grieving family trying to hold on to the tatters of their world stayed consistent even through the final battle. I can forgive a lot because of the strong sense of character and connection there.

Plus, it’s a comic book movie. Spectacle is the name of the game and at least this one had cool fantasy beasts and dope fight choreo. 

Anyway, I’ve rambled enough. Let’s wrap it up here. Suffice it to say, I had a wonderful time with this movie. I’m ready for the next one!

[scuttleboat]

Parenthood as a Major Theme in The Witcher

aka a defense of Yennefer's fertility arc

In some commentary on The Witcher season 1, I've read about disappointment that mid-season Yennefer spends her story time dedicated to hunting a fertility cure. The primary critique of this 2-episode arc for her is that it appears to conform too readily to a trope that "all women eventually want babies", and also seems counter to her previous disregard and cynicism for the idea of motherhood.

I think there's two cases that can be made that demonstrate why this element of the series deserves more than to be judged as "lazy or reductive writing". The first is Yennefer's personal journey--which after two viewings I believe holds up strongly. The second, even bigger case is what the theme of parenthood means to the show, and why Yennefer is only one of several aspects of it. That's what I am going to talk about in this post. Expect full spoilers for season 1.

Birth, Babies, and Legacy in Season 1

To put it bluntly, the topic of reproduction is all over The Witcher. The show is kind of obsessed with it. Let's go through the ways that parenthood and/or reproduction feature significantly in every episode:

1 - The conflict in Blaviken is a result of Stregobor's murderous obsession with killing babies born under a supposed curse. Those  infants and girls represented power that he wanted to terminate. In Cintra, Ciri becomes an orphan.

2 - Yennefer's mixed elven parentage is the source of her power and her physical deformity. Trauma is inherited generationally, seen again in Fillavandrel's outcast society, stripped of heritage and legacy. Jaskier's first song references abortion.

3 - A striga is made when a pregnant woman is cursed and her undead fetus becomes a ravenous monster. Foltest wants her to be rescued to live as his child and heir. Her monster body still has its umbilical cord--a gnarly cosmetic flourish that drives the point home. In Aretuza's scary gyno chair, Yen is sterilized in exchange for ultra-performative femininity. Although she consents, it is a corrupt bargain designed to exploit her.

4 - The Queen of Aederin and her newborn are assassinated for being unable to birth a male baby. Yennefer almost dies trying to prevent it, then gives a monologue about how the patriarchy only sees women as vessels.  Queen Calanthe tries to protect her daughter from the Law of Surprise, only to see it initiated again on her grandchild.

5 - After some 50 years as a mage Yen goes hunting for a fertility cure, using alchemy and then a djinn. She tells Tassaia that although she knew what she was giving up in Aretuza, "I didn't know what it would mean to me." Also, wow a lot of sex is had.

6 - Geralt and Yen talk about parenthood and their respective lost opportunities. The episode mcguffin is a dragon egg, whom they both fight to defend. Borch Three Jackdaws states the theme of parenthood outright. On the surface he is proclaiming his own motivation, but in the context of Geralt and Yennefer's prior discussions we know that he is speaking for both them and the show as a whole:

"This is my final 'first'. A child. This treasure, this legacy, must endure. There is no other reason to go on."

Episode 6 also shows how Geralt and Yen have grown since episode  4. She is forced to accept that natural birth is impossible, and Geralt is forced to reflect out loud that it's only fear of parental failure that has prevented him from claiming his own child. 

7 -  On getting news of the Nilfgaard invasion, Geralt decides to claim Ciri. Calanthe and Eist go to extremes to keep their child in their family.

8 - Everyone wants to be Ciri's new family, including this nice woman who doesn't have any daughters. In the end, Geralt finally becomes a father. 

Destiny = Family 

I firmly believe that the show is leading us to a point where Geralt, Yennefer, and Ciri form an eventual family. The desire for family is verbalized multiple times for Ciri, notably in Brokilon Forest when she calls Dara her family, and then when Dara leaves her and tells her find another family. Twice in the show women try to adopt Ciri, promising safety and care. Yet she's driven by a strong directive to find Geralt as "he is your destiny".  She is his Child Surprise, essentially this universe's fucked up version of a godchild. And the Law of Surprise is not just tradition, but a cosmic binding with tangible consequences. Geralt initially denies this, but Duny, Eist, Mousesack, Yennefer, and Borch all vocalize it, and season 1 events bear it out.

If Ciri is steered by a bond of destiny, so is Geralt. When he rejects the Child Surprise at Pavetta's wedding, Mousesack warns that doing so will bring ill fortune. Episode 5 and 6 subtly but persistently imply that this prophecy is true, as the witcher's next several years are filled with sleeplessness and an undefined longing. Magically binding himself to Yennefer alleviates some of that (essentially by making him happy), but I don't think it's only because of love, but also because his destiny being intertwined with Yennefer is a step towards his destiny being intertwined with Ciri. Because even after getting some peaceful nights with intermittent Yennaffairs (get it? hah!), something still seems off with Geralt.

"You feel it just the same as me that hole inside you. That itch inside your brain keeps you awake at night. Come with me, I'll show you what you're missing." - Borch Three Jackdaws

This is a cute screenplay trick because we assume that he's talking about nostalgic adventure, but on review he's actually talking about parenthood. Later when Geralt gripes that the thing he was missing is Yennefer as she walks away again, Borch replies, "What you're missing is still out there. Your legacy, your destiny. I know it." (hello Ciri!) We never get a clear idea of why Mr. Three Cool Names knows all this stuff, but I didn't care because a dragon being cryptically omniscient is exactly the sort of thing I want from my fantasy shows.

Conclusion 

So it's family, family, family. Yennefer is just one corner of this thematic tapestry; the other three are Geralt, Ciri, and #destiny. Their journey to find each other, to accept these bonds, is what the show is about. I expect the theme to cement even more in future seasons.

Consequently, to reduce Yennefer's storyline to cliché alone is to miss the way everyone on this show is obsessed with parenthood in some form. It also misses how much fatherhood will be central Geralt's journey.  Even if he came to the same decision 2 episodes (and 13 years) later than Yen did, Geralt actively decides that he want to claim his role as a parent figure. That isn't the easy gripe target of "women want babies", but the point is that Yen and Geralt are both on the same path, with Ciri as the destination. A character can have something that resembles part of a cliché without being negatively defined by it. In The Witcher, the greater context is relevant to this critique.

So I urge you to look at the full season and see how her fertility arc fits into the big picture. If you still wish that Yen had continued to be proudly child-free, then I respect your desire to see that story told. However, it would be worth it to recognize now that this probably isn't going to be the story you want. Parenthood is a big part of it. This story is going to be about two magical adults and one magical child becoming a family.

A family of total badasses, adopted through destiny and love.

[midnightactual]

As a child, before she acquired a zanpakuto, did she have an idea or fantasy of what she wanted her abilities to look like? Was she consequently excited or disappointing with the reality of how her soul manifested its power? (if she had one more or less since as long as she can remember, can you talk a little bit about the Shihoin's traditions in training their heirs and the logic or superstition behind it?)

I’m going to take the scenic route in answering this one, so you’ll have to bear with me. I’ve been (probably rather obviously) watching Cobra Kai lately (into season 3 now) and although there are lots of things to recommend it, two things that I think are very interesting about it (and that apply to this question) are the themes of generational trauma and incomplete philosophies of life. The first—the mistakes and overcorrections of one generation transferring to the next—is pretty self evident, but the second bears some more scrutiny.

Cobra Kai, the dōjō, has a simple set of three rules: “Strike first. Strike hard. No mercy.” Meanwhile, Miyagi-Do, the dōjō, has just one ethos: “First learn balance. Balance good, karate good, everything good.” A thing that I think the show strives to communicate without constantly shoving it in the viewer’s face is that both are right, actually. They’re just incomplete. Both are inflexible. Cobra Kai’s logic has ruthlessness when it counts, but lacks balance and predictably always overcommits. Miyagi-Do’s logic has balance, but lacks the ability to commit and engage decisively. Both are unsustainable. And the problem with Cobra Kai’s ethos in particular is that it can’t be readily grasped by teenagers, because it takes wisdom and experience to see its failings. (Meanwhile, Miyagi-Do’s ethos can cultivate wisdom, but it can become a trap that prevents thinking outside the box it creates.) Johnny Lawrence eventually figures this out from the Cobra Kai end through a long series of painful missteps, and sums it up with:

“This creed on the wall... follow it to the letter, it'll make you strong. It’ll make you formidable. It will also make you an asshole. ’Cause that’s just black paint on a white wall. But life’s not black and white. More often than not, it’s gray. And it’s in those gray areas where Johnny Lawrence’s Cobra Kai... sometimes shows mercy.”

So, what does all that have to do with Yoruichi? Well, my conception of the Shihōin Clan, even before I ever saw that show, is that it possessed a mindset a lot like Cobra Kai. (At the time I started here, I imagined her home life as a child as being like a more watered down version of what Azula and Zuko endured under Ozai and Ursa in Avatar: The Last Airbender, with Yoruichi’s father being ultimately rather less of an asshole than Ozai and reforming, and that still fits and correlates quite well to my current thinking, but Cobra Kai makes for a more apt comparison.)

The Shihōin are not only the masters of the martial arts within Soul Society’s nobility, but of combat, conflict, and war as a whole. That is, in a sense, their “purpose”. They’re warriors, right down to their genes, because they not only train for combat (in a grueling and regimented way from childhood, a la the SPARTAN-II program in Halo, or the one shown in Soldier) but they historically bred for it too. (And to some extent, still do, with reiatsu output and quality having been a major element of mate selection as recently as with Yoruichi’s parents, and with even Yoruichi herself sort of subconsciously looking down on the possibility of meaningful long-term intimate relationships with notably weaker partners.)

Anyway, the ultimate traditional end-product of this was Yoruichi, and she reflects the pathologies of the process as much as she does its culmination. (Her decisive defeat of her relatives in Agni Kai to become Clan Head was the ultimate proof of her superior ability and pedigree within this system.) There’s some indication (from Yoruichi herself) that Yūshirō might have an even easier time of achieving power than her, but I view him as a product of a newer, different, and superior process. (Basically: Yoruichi broke the old one, and Yūshirō’s far more playful attitude is a product of a different childhood environment after Yōsuke chilled the fuck out and stopped trying to be Kreese/Ozai; play is really how mammals learn best, after all. Someone like Yūno, @ice-cold-shihoin’s middle sibling OC, is to my mind a sort of intermediary step in this transitional process.)

In other words, Yoruichi was raised to be a complete badass. The total package. The perfect soldier. The ultimate weapon. Not just battlefield superiority, but battlefield supremacy. Strike first. Strike hard. No mercy. And so to finally come back to your actual question, she dreamed of a zanpakutō that’d help her be exactly that: a badass. I don’t think she was really too focused on the nature of how that worked, exactly, so long as it did.

The trouble is: she got it. She joined the Onmitsukidō at 100, manifested her asauchi into a zanpakutō (Kurayami) before she was 101, had her Shikai before she was 103, it became a(n actual) permanent-release type by the time she was 145, and she achieved Bankai at 152. Kurayami’s Shikai form seems rather plain and boring compared to many—unless she so chooses, the sword cannot be perceived except when its edge or point is penetrating a target, and then only visually—but that belies a simple point: it exists purely to kill. Not to duel, not to pacify, not to disarm... to kill, and with the first strike. It’s a blade purely for assassination. And this is even more true of her Bankai, Kurayami Kara Umareta Daikokutennyo, which exists for mass destruction and slaughter. She got exactly what she always dreamed of, and it completely horrified her.

Even by the time she got her Bankai, she had some inkling of what Johnny’s trying to communicate in the earlier quote. She knew that her zanpakutō was inflexible, its use was unsustainable, and that leaning into it too heavily and becoming habituated to it would make her a murderous asshole. (Think like Unohana Yachiru, but even more so, because using Kurayami doesn’t foster any sort of sense of good sportsmanship.) The reason for that is obvious: when all you have is a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail. It didn’t help that Kurayami, the zanpakutō spirit, was (and has always been) a kind of dark Azula-like mirror of Yoruichi herself, Yoruichi-As-She-Might-Have-Been had she not met Kaien. (Kind of like Ichigo and “Shirosaki” Zangetsu, but not nearly so extreme or directly comparable as Yoruichi has obviously [?] had no Hollowfication exposure.)

And so, just as Yoruichi had already blatantly rejected her father’s initial efforts to raise her like a boy by radically asserting her femininity, and just as she had tacitly rejected the Shihōin Clan’s focus on total efficiency by becoming far more sociable and using social engineering as much as combat ability, so too did she reject her zanpakutō by developing Shunkō.

It’s only in the present, with the aid of (bitter) wisdom and experience, that she’s gone back to it to not only try use it, but to bend it to her will rather than being afraid of it bending her to its. (To carry on with my theme here, this is actually kinda like adult Johnny going back to try and redeem the Cobra Kai dōjō of his youth and turn it into something more positive.)

Shorter answer: she wanted a badass zanpakutō, and she got rather more than she bargained for in the process. (With all that that says about the base nature of her soul and id, for lack of a better term.)

[a-blue-secret]

CHAPTER XII

BACK TO MASTERLIST

Chapter XI | Chapter XII | Chapter XIII

GENRES: royal au; fantasy au; magic au; friends-to-enemies-to-lovers; king!beomgyu, vizier!taehyun

PAIRING: taegyu

WARNINGS: swearing (Taehyun has the mouth of a sailor smh)

WORD COUNT: 4.8k+

AN: This is a chapter y'all have probably been waiting for! Here, we get to see Taehyun's reaction :)

SUMMARY: Best friends turned enemies, Kang Taehyun has managed to trick Choi Beomgyu into his service, and to rule for a year and a day, until his youngest brother would be old enough to take the throne. Choi Beomgyu has no intention of being obedient however, and tries to thwart Taehyun’s orders at every turn. With a growing amount of distrust and lies within the court, will Taehyun manage to keep the kingdom of Gojongja from falling apart?

Taehyun strode up to Beomgyu’s door. “Hello, Seojung. Can I talk to Beomgyu?”

“The King wishes to talk to no one,” the guard responded. “He is taking no visitors.”

Taehyun sighed, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Tell him it’s his vizier, who really needs to talk to him.”

Still, Seojung shook his head. “He has explicitly expressed he does not want to talk to you,” he said.

Taehyun pursed his lips in frustration. “Fine.” He walked away, annoyed. “Guess I’ll have to employ the military myself…”

As Taehyun disappeared round the corner, Beomgyu cracked the door open and peered outside. “Has he gone?”

“He has, sire.”

“Oh good.” Beomgyu breathed a sigh of relief, and stepped out from behind the door.

“Sire?”

“Yes?” Beomgyu turned to Seojung.

“You know that you will have to talk to Sir Taehyun eventually. As he is your vizier, you are obligated to listen to the advice he gives you.”

Beomgyu rolled his eyes, groaning. “Not you too! That’s what Chan said as well.” He crossed his arms childishly. “What if I don’t want to?”

“You have to. It is your duty.”

“Hmph.” Beomgyu pouted, but didn’t say anything. He sniffed pettily, and retreated back into his room.

.・゜-: ✧ :-

“Oh, Taehyun!”

Taehyun turned around to see Yeonjun jogging up to him. “Hey, Yeonjun. What’s up?”

“You said you trusted me, right?” Yeonjun asked, once he’d reached the vizier.

Taehyun nodded. “Yes. I did.”

“Well, there’s something I wanted to tell you. Could you come to my room?”

Taehyun thought for a moment. “Uhm, sure. Yeah, I have time. Wanna go now?”

Taehyun followed Yeonjun down the halls and into the room the Aruyeonan was staying. He patiently stood in the middle of the room while Yeonjun paced around.

“Take your time, don’t worry,” Taehyun reassured him. As Yeonjun was pacing, the edge of the curtain snaked around his ankle, and he quickly shook it off. Taehyun raised an eyebrow. The Aruyeonan must be really nervous, if he was losing control of his ability. Finally, Yeonjun ran a hand through his hair and sighed, sitting down on the bed.

“I, uh… okay. I’m ready now.” He took a deep breath, and began to speak.

“Even being the son of a lord, I didn’t have the best childhood growing up,” Yeonjun began. “Father was always too busy to take care of me, and Mother was more interested in being part of the social hierarchy in the court. I guess you could say I was... lonely. I was lonely, but… then gained a brother."

Yeonjun smiled a little." Mother never had another child after me. But, a boy from the West came into our court one day, and our clan adopted him. He went through the whole ability-adopting process and everything; I was so excited at the thought of finally having a sibling. Only, the operation went wrong. Instead of having our ability - inanimate object manipulation – he gained a new one. Matter manipulation.”

“Matter manipulation? What’s that?”

“It’s not an actual ability. When they were doing the operation, the ability mutated and he gained something else. He can manipulate an object’s state of matter. Make solid into liquid, gas into solid, et cetera et cetera, while also changing solids. He can make stone into metal, or wood into stone, or metal into wood. Anything to do with an object’s matter, he could manipulate it.”

Yeonjun smiled bitterly. “The operation also went wrong in the fact that he kept his old ability, too. People were shocked and kind of repelled by it, and asked if we still wanted him in our clan. Mother and Father, being the leading family in our clan, had the last say on the matter. I begged and begged them to let him stay. I told them that if we rejected him he’d have nowhere to go, and would die alone. Eventually, they agreed to let him stay as part of our clan. He became my brother, my adorable little brother. For the first time ever, I had a companion. We laughed together, played together, did everything together.” Yeonjun’s eyes glazed over as he reminisced.

“It was… they were the best years of my life. But as time went on, it soon became clear that things were not going… the best for him.”

Taehyun tilted his head. “How do you mean?”

“You’ve probably heard a lot that Aruyeo is the best at being welcoming to all people, regardless of sexuality or gender or race?”

Taehyun nodded. “Duh, everyone knows that. It’s literally a fact.”

“Well throw that ‘fact’ out the window. Because it’s not true at all.”

Taehyun blinked. “Say what?”

“If there’s one thing Aruyeo aren’t that accepting of, it’s Westerners,” Yeonjun explained. “Being a defensive Kingdom, they automatically dislike people not from the Four Kingdoms. The ‘fact’ about them being welcoming is true to some extent, however. They accept different sexualities, and even different Kingdoms, but they just can’t accept foreigners. They just couldn’t accept him. When our parents died at a young age – an assassination, I tell you, even though we couldn’t prove it – we were left to fend for ourselves. I was barely an adult, and had my younger brother to look after too. He was constantly pushed around and bullied, too, which didn’t make life any easier. It broke my heart whenever I noticed a bruise he tried to hide from me, or when I saw him getting called racial slurs, and he’d just hang his head without saying anything.”

“How– how has none of this ever reached other Kingdoms?” Taehyun asked, in disbelief.

“It’s rare any foreigners even come to Aruyeo,” Yeonjun said. “Anyone that does receives the same treatment my brother did.”

Taehyun shook his head. “That’s awful. Couldn’t you do anything?”

“I couldn’t. They were all more powerful members of the court. Now I think about it, it’s a miracle I even managed to convince my parents to let him stay in the clan.”

Yeonjun paused, looking at Taehyun. “But I’m rambling now. Before I tell you the important thing, though, I just want to make sure of something.”

“Okay…?”

“Do you trust me?”

Taehyun looked at Yeonjun, searching within his fox-like eyes. He searched for any hint of underlying intentions, and hint of sinister motives, any malicious intent in his eye. There was none. All he could see was a truthful, hopeful, slightly nervous Yeonjun, staring back at him with his amber eyes. He took a deep breath.

“Yes. Yes, I trust you.”

“Okay, good.” Yeonjun paused. “Hueningkai is my adoptive brother. Hueningkai, the one who made that marble.”

Taehyun nodded slowly. “Okay.”

“He’s the one who was bullied because he was a Westerner, and because he didn’t have a… normal ability.”

Taehyun blinked, and nodded again. “Okay.”

“And he hated being different.”

“Okay.”

“And so, we became more involved in court.”

Taehyun opened his mouth to say ‘okay’ again, but Yeonjun held a finger up. “Please, just listen. Say a word and I might lose my nerve and not tell you.” Taehyun shut his mouth, and gestured for Yeonjun to carry on.

“We became more involved, to try and gain some protection. He… we… Queen Erajin needed informants. She needed people to tell her things. She needed information about things, and being an informant would give us a crazy amount of security, not only financially but status-wise as well, because we’d almost immediately be higher than anyone else in court, basically preventing anyone from bullying him, and me. It was tempting. We- we took on this role. We… we are her informants. We were those people. Taehyun, don’t run away but… we’re her spies.”

Taehyun tripped over a fold in the carpet and almost fell over backwards. “What the- what the fuck.”

“We were Queen Erajin’s spies. But we’re not anymore! Something weird is happening. Just like Scholar Min said. He caught on quicker than I did. She sent us here to find out any dirt about Gojongja, to see if she could corrupt the people’s view of you. I thought nothing of it. I’ve done things like that in other Kingdoms, and even in Aruyeo, many times before. It wasn’t my place to question. When you told me about all that you’re doing to try and help your people, though, it made me hesitate. You’re so good. There’s nothing sinister or bad about the way you rule. And it made me question, ‘Why was she doing this? What does she gain out of this?’ Something is not right, and yours and Beomgyu’s sincere natures help me realise that. Taehyun, please believe me, we’re not her spies anymore.”

Taehyun was shaking. Either from terror or anger, he wasn’t sure."What the fuck."

"A-and also… Hueningkai, he's here. He's the one I sent a letter to, back during the revel. I was telling him that something was off with Queen Erajin, and that day he also came with me to see what I meant. He’s here right now."

"What the fuck."

"Taehyun, please, I – we – are not spies for her anymore. Well, we still are, but we're not going to report back! Please Taehyun, believe me."

Taehyun gripped the chest of drawers tightly, knuckles white. "What the fuck," he whispered, staring at Yeonjun with wide eyes. "You… you're a spy." He shook his head. "I knew there was something off about you."

"Taehyun, please believe me. We're not working for her anymore, something is seriously wrong with the Aruyeonan court and I don't want to be a part of it."

Taehyun didn't seem to hear him. "You… I told you so much. I trusted you so much. I should banish you. I should execute you, accuse you of treason, make sure you never breathe again. What Lord Hyunjin wrote also makes sense now. It's an acronym, albeit a weird one. C, H, O, I… You're a Jeonju Choi, right?"

Yeonjun started. "Hyunjin's been in contact with you?" He licked his lips nervously, face pale. "And yes. Yes I am."

Taehyun laughed ruefully, looking down. He rubbed his eyes, head in hands. "He told me not to trust the Jeonju Chois. I shouldn't trust you Jeonju Chois." Taehyun lifted his eyes up to Yeonjun. "So then why do I still trust you?"

"Yeonjun?" A voice said, and a tall, young boy entered the room from what appeared to be a hole in the wall. Taehyun visibly flinched, gripping the chest of drawers tighter. This must be Hueningkai, he thought. God, he's tall. He could see the Western features prominent in his nose and eyebrows, but other than that he could pass for a normal person from the Four Kingdoms.

"Did you tell the vizier? That we're the good guys now?"

Yeonjun quickly got up and went over to the boy. "Not now, Hueningkai," he said quietly. "Taehyun's still here, and he's in a bit of a shock."

"But, you told him we're good, right? And he said he trusts you."

Yeonjun ran a hand through his hair, anxiously looking at the vizier who was staring at them, eyes unfocused. "I think… I don't know. I think there's only so much trust can do."

"Can I talk to him?" The boy blinked innocent eyes at Yeonjun.

"What? Hueningkai, no! You're basically a stranger, he's not going to–"

"Hello," the boy said, darting past Yeonjun to walk up to Taehyun. The vizier, who was still holding onto the corner of the drawers for dear life, looked up at him.

"My name is Hueningkai," he said. He held out his hand towards Taehyun, as if to shake hands. Taehyun just stared at the outstretched hand, and after a beat Hueningkai dropped it. "I'm the adoptive brother of Yeonjun. You probably don't trust us. That's a good idea, since we literally just admitted we were spies."

Taehyun found his voice long enough to be able to scoff. "Yeah, no shit. I'm not really sure how to process anything right now. I'm contemplating whether to believe you, or throw you into the dungeons."

Hueningkai smiled kindly. "That's understandable. But, I just want you to think about it. If we were truly going to betray you, do you think we'd admit to this? We're putting our lives in your hands. We are doing this because we feel that what Queen Erajin is doing is sinister and slightly scary, and we want to go against that. We are risking our lives here. If word gets out that we have betrayed Her Highness, we'll be executed. We’re spies, after all. We’re trusted with information that ought not to reach anyone else. She’ll have no choice but to kill us. And yet, we're trusting you with the information. Yeonjun really admires you. He really trusts you, too. Please, believe us."

Taehyun gaped at Hueningkai, before quickly closing his mouth and prising his stiff fingers from the wood. "I… this is so much to process. You're… spies?"

Yeonjun was standing helplessly behind Hueningkai, a doomed look on his face. "Please, Taehyun. I trust you."

"I– I don't know what to do," Taehyun said. "It's just so much to process." He staggered to the door, and opened it. "Give me time."

With those words, Taehyun closed the door, and Yeonjun and Hueningkai were left alone in Yeonjun's room. The elder bit his lip. "Kang Taehyun, please trust us. Something is happening in Aruyeo, and I don't like it one bit."

.・゜-: ✧ :-

Taehyun, once he’d reached his room, collapsed into a chair. His hands were shaking. He dragged a hand across his face, still processing what just happened. A knock came from his door.

“Sire, you have–”

“Cancel it!” Taehyun interrupted. “Whatever I have, cancel it!”

“But sire, they–”

“I don’t care! Cancel everything I have today!” Taehyun yelled. Jungwon was silent.

“Very well, sir.”

Taehyun blinked rapidly, sinking further into the velvet. “He was a spy,” he whispered to himself. “No- he is a spy. And he fucking brought a spy friend with him as well. He was a spy from Aruyeo. I can’t believe I trusted him!” he yelled out, throwing a cushion towards the opposite wall. “I just… gah!” He clenched his hair into his fists. “I almost told him as well!” He whimpered as his fists unfurled themselves, hands shaking too much to have a tight grip on his hair. “I trusted him… I trusted Yeonjun…”

Taehyun sat in the same chair for several hours, until his trembling died down. At that point, it was late afternoon. Hand over his eyes, Taehyun took a deep breath and exhaled heavily. “Alright,” he said to himself. “Let’s get this in order shall we?” Taehyun took his hand away from his eyes, but his eyes still remained closed. He gestured with his fingers vaguely into the air as he began speaking again. “So Yeonjun was a spy. Working for Queen Erajin. And he came here to gather – dirt, was it? – on the Gojongja court, to feed back to the queen. But he said that he’s now… what? Good?” Taehyun scoffed. “Judging by how he spoke, he’s been a spy for a while. I bet his allegiance can’t change just like that.” Taehyun paused, and cracked open an eye. “That Hueningkai guy though… he’s kind of right. Why would they tell me if they were still loyal to Queen Erajin? Unless… it’s a tactic for me to let my guard down.” Taehyun nodded darkly to himself. “That’s it. They’re trying to trick me into trusting them, using it as a chance to get to know other secrets.”

Taehyun opened his eyes fully, now feeling more grounded in his thoughts. “Yes, that’s got to be it. I’ve gotten them all figured out. No need to stress. It’ll look bad if I lock them up, so I’ll just ignore them. Yes- I’ll do that.”

He sat up, but quickly deflated again. “Wait… what if they’re telling the truth? In which case it would be stupid not to trust them, because I would be endangering their lives if I didn’t…”

Taehyun sighed, rubbing his nose frustratedly. “Ah, I don’t know.” He paused. “Although, it is more believable that they’re just trying to trick me. But hang on, that would mean I’m okay with the fact they’re spies!” He threw his hands up in the air, leaning back in the armchair. “Ugh, I’m confused…”

Just then, a knock sounded at his door. “Sir, they said that today is the only day–”

“Tell them no! Tell them they have to have another day!” Taehyun yelled. “I can’t do it!”

He went back to muttering to himself. “Wait… but I still can’t trust them. They’re spies, after all. You’d have to be an idiot to trust a spy.” But then he paused. Suddenly, all he could see were Yeonjun’s clear, amber eyes, staring at him with a mixture of nervousness and hope. There had been no trace of an evil or manipulating nature there at all. Taehyun frowned, now more confused than ever.

“Sir, today is the absolutely only day you can talk to the Head General. They won’t be able to come for more than a month after this.”

Taehyun’s mouth pursed in annoyance. “Fine! Fine!” He stalked across the room and opened the door. “Fine! If it’s the only day, then I’ll do it,” he said. “I’ll go there now.”

“Sir?” Taehyun looked at Jungwon, pausing his frustrated march down the hall. “Apparently, since you are going in the King’s place, it is necessary for you to take a high-ranking Lord with you to see the Head General.”

Taehyun huffed, still irritated. Then, his frown melted away as he thought. “Hm… fine. Which Lord was it that said they supported us…? Ah, that’s right. Where’s Lord Soobin?”

.・゜-: ✧ :-

Taehyun nodded thoughtfully. “Alright, so it won’t be necessary to bring too many people, like you said. I know of a few places they can be stationed, but I’m not sure about the west of Gojongja.”

“Oh, I know a few,” Lord Soobin spoke up. He circled his finger around several places on their map. “Here, here, and here will be good places. They’re not too imposing, but they’ll be obvious. That’s what we want, right?”

“Right,” Taehyun agreed, tapping his chin. “Hm, I don’t know West Gojongja too well, but I have faith in you, Lord Soobin.” He looked up at the Head General. “What do you say?”

“Looks fine to me,” the general responded. “How many men would you say you’d need? We will do our best to cater to your preferences.”

Taehyun turned to Soobin.

“I would say just five men per station,” the Lord replied. “We are looking to simply discourage them. Too many would seem overpowering, but too little would seem odd.”

Taehyun nodded. “Five seems fine to me. Would that be okay with you?”

“Indeed, it is alright with us. I will have the men selected right away. When would you like them stationed?”

“As soon as possible, if you may,” Taehyun said. “Though the riot has died down a little, we can never know when it will flare up again.”

The general nodded. “Of course, sire.” He bowed, and made as if to leave when he paused and turned back. “Ah, when would you like them to retreat from the public? At what stage would you deem it suitable to withdraw the army?”

“Um…” Taehyun tapped his chin. “I’ll let you know when they should withdraw,” he said finally.

“Additionally, when the public atmosphere reverts back to normal would be a good time too,” Lord Soobin added, frowning thoughtfully down at the map of Gojongja. “We should probably install more guards around the palace,” he commented.

Taehyun nodded. “Yes, that would probably be a good idea. I’ll employ some Invisi as well.” He gestured to the Head General. “You are dismissed.”

Once the Head General had left, Taehyun turned to Soobin, and the two left the room as well. “Thank you for accompanying me on such short notice,” he said.

“Oh, it was no trouble at all,” Lord Soobin replied easily. “Indeed, it was an honour.”

Taehyun smiled. “Well, with His Greatness having taken a break for an unspecified amount of time, we may see each other more often.”

Soobin gave a small smile too. “If I may ask, would you happen to know when King Beomgyu will come back to governing the Kingdom?"

Taehyun sighed. "You may ask, but I don't know the answer myself. But I'm going to have to drag him out sooner or later, so he will come back eventually."

Soobin nodded, and bowed. "It was incredibly nice to discuss matters with you, Sir Taehyun."

Taehyun inclined his head. "Likewise, Lord Soobin."

The tall Lord bowed again before walking away. Taehyun stared after him rather enviously.

"He's so tall… I wanna grow that tall."

.・゜-: ✧ :-

“Oh? Lord Soobin?”

Taehyun watched as Soobin flinched, rubbing his eyes vigorously. “Oh, I didn’t mean to startle you,” Taehyun said.

“Don’t worry, don’t worry,” Soobin said, waving his hands in an attempt to reassure Taehyun. “Was there a reason you came here to the library?”

“As a matter of fact, I was looking for you,” Taehyun said. “Do you mind if I–?”

“Oh, of course not,” Soobin said, shuffling over to make room for Taehyun at the table. Taehyun sat down and spread out all his documents across the wooden surface. Soobin scanned through all of them, and looked at the vizier, eyes wide. “You’re replacing council members?”

“King Beomgyu wants it done, that’s why,” sighed Taehyun, carelessly flicking a parchment across the table. “If he hadn’t insisted, I wouldn’t be doing this at all. It’s too much hard work. Also, it’s a little confusing, so I wanted to ask you about it.”

Soobin raised an eyebrow bemusedly. “Me? So suddenly? We’ve barely met. Surely there’s someone else you normally talk to about this? Doesn’t the Grand Vizier have smart friends of his own?”

Normally, I’d talk to Yeonjun about this, but… he betrayed me. Taehyun shook his head vigorously. “No. I do everything alone.”

Soobin hummed. “Interesting. Okay, let me see these papers. I might be able to help.”

.・゜-: ✧ :-

Soobin tapped his fingers on the table while chewing the feathered end of his quill. After a while, he set down the parchment and dragged the other documents towards him, reading through them one by one. Taehyun rested his head on his hand, watching as Soobin analysed the papers.

“Apparently word has gotten out that I’m going to be changing the members of the council,” Taehyun spoke up. “I received many letters from the clans involved, telling me off for even thinking such a thing.”

Soobin looked up at him, feathers still in his mouth. “Do you have them with you?”

“Uh… how will they help?”

Soobin held out his hand as Taehyun rummaged through his case. He wordlessly handed the letters over to the Lord. “These clans know things. It’s likely they’ve unintentionally given you pointers as to how to go about replacing council members, while they were reprimanding you. Ah! See, like here.” Soobin pointed to a few lines written in angry handwriting. “‘Why would you go through the trouble of background checking every Lord you see, when you have a perfectly good council, whose backgrounds are already fully checked?’ So whoever you want to employ for the new Council, you’ll need to do a background check first. And look, this one. ‘Finding a Lord to match the one you replaced will be difficult. All the Lords of the current Council are far more experienced than any of the other Lords in court, so there will be no point.’ So for every Lord you remove, you’ll need to replace him with one who matches his skill and intelligence.”

“Yes, but that’s where it gets complicated,” Taehyun explained, reaching for one of the papers on the table. “If you look at the Gojongja citizen rights, it says that everyone’s capability is different and they ought not to be compared to one another.”

Soobin tsked, pushing aside the paper. “No one follows those rules that precisely! It’s fine. Oh look, and here it says that you can’t replace members one by one, and if you want to replace one Lord you’ll need to replace all of them at the same time. So it would be best for you to have all the new members ready before you officially announce that you’re replacing the Council.” He handed the letters back to Taehyun, smiling. “See? That wasn’t so confusing, was it?”

“Now that I have someone else explaining it to me, it’s actually ridiculously easy,” Taehyun admitted, taking the letters back from Soobin. “Thank you. Now all I need to do is find Lords to be part of the new council.” Taehyun paused in the middle of tidying away his papers, sighing. “Oh, that’s going to be hard. Barely anyone is trustworthy right now…”

“I know a few people who I could offer to you,” Soobin said. “If you’d like, of course.”

Taehyun turned to Soobin, eyes wide. “Yes, that would be so helpful! If you could maybe let me know of their names, and I’ll do a background check on them at once! Um, would you, Lord Soobin, like to be on the council?”

“Oh, no, no. Gosh, no! I’d prefer to be a close friend than a colleague,” Soobin said, smiling. Taehyun beamed back, snapping shut his case.

“Thank you so much, Lord Soobin. You’ve been a great help.”

“It was my pleasure.”

Soobin watched as Taehyun bowed happily and walked out of the library. He turned back to the book he’d been looking at before the vizier had arrived, a small smile on his face. He hadn’t expected the scary, intimidating Grand Vizier to look so… cute when he was happy.

.・゜-: ✧ :-

Taehyun was outside Yeonjun's room again. After returning to his room, now fully understanding how to replace members of the council, his mind drifted back to the spy, and also the dilemma he was in. Should he trust Yeonjun? Should he lock him up? What should he do?

Unable to stay trapped in one room with his thoughts, Taehyun had wandered through the palace and, while he’d tried his best to stay away, his feet kept directing him towards the spy’s chambers.

And so there he was, for the third time that day, biting his nails nervously, staring at the white door in front of him. It appeared that Yeonjun had gotten rid of his guard: at that moment, it was just him and the door. (Taehyun had sent Heesung away to do other business.) He lifted his hand as if to knock, but quickly retreated, clasping his hands behind his back.

"No, no, no," he muttered to himself. "What am I doing? I should leave before those spies find out I'm here." But still, he stood in front of Yeonjun's door. He scratched the side of his neck with the back of his nails, biting his lip. He shook his head, and backed away.

"No, no no. Let's go." With some hesitation, he moved away, quickly walking back down the hallway before his feet changed their mind.

Inside Yeonjun's (and Hueningkai's) room, the two of them were staring at the glass ball.

"Oh look, he left again," Hueningkai sighed boredly, chin rested on his palm. "I know you said to give him space, Yeonjun, but this is a bit… much. If this keeps happening, we're not going to get anywhere."

"We should let him come to us," Yeonjun stated firmly. "We thrust this news upon him rather suddenly. He's bound to feel conflicted. Give him time. Then, we'll see what his final reaction will be."

"He's not giving much of a clear reaction right now," Hueningkai commented as they watched the vizier come up to the door again. "Look, he's come back."

Yeonjun smacked the younger upside the head. "Stop spying on him," he scolded.

"Hey!" Hueningkai complained, rubbing his head. "We're literally spies, what do you want me to do?"

"Don't spy on Taehyun, that's all," Yeonjun said. "It's immoral. Especially if we want him to trust us."

Hueningkai sighed, putting the ball away. "Fine. But what if he never trusts us? What if we stay stuck in this loop forever?"

"We won't," Yeonjun said. "He may seem unsure now, but Taehyun has a really strong mindset. He'll come to a decision soon."

Hueningkai shrugged, leaning back when they heard the vizier's footsteps retreat yet again. "If you say so."

[maero]

【 10 】 A t m o s p h e r i c - You’re My Target

Summary: You’re an assassin, he’s the man you’re tasked with. What could possibly go wrong?

Pairing: Johnny Seo (NCT) x Reader

Word count: 1,100

Warnings: Contains foul language and mature scenes/topics. Continue at your own discretion.

CHAPTER 11

At the strike of 6am, you both woke up to catch the plane all the way to Florida keys. You wouldn't get there until sometime tomorrow as it takes around 20 hours from Chicago to get there. The amount of time spent on the plane will probably make you go insane but what's at the end of the ride is the only thing that's motivating you as it is absolutely breathtaking. You both barely converse as it is way too early to make small talk this early in the morning. All you could think about was paradise and probably the same with Johnny if you think about it. Escapism. The best source of running away from your problems and also another way of solving them.

The whole process of getting to the airport and eventually getting on the plane was a blur. It took way too long and yet all you could do in those moments was stand there waiting in agony for comfort of those plane seats. If you were being honest, as soon as you both sit down in the plane you were out like a light. At least this would cause time to go faster. By this time it was 9am. The plane finally took off and both of your were sound asleep already. Numerous amount of hours went by due to sleep. You woke up first and checked your phone. "5pm" not bad, 12 more hours until you arrive in Florida keys. You look to your left and see Johnny sleeping peacefully next to you. His black hair had become messy and my god was it hot. You had to control yourself though and forcefully made yourself face the front and pretend to look through the selection of movies just in case he woke up.

Time went by slowly, you began to feel restless and a bit frustrated but you knew that this long flight was going to be painful. Before you knew it, the man behind the speaker announced that you were landing in around 10 minutes. Finally. You stretched your arms up and accidentally hit johnny in the face in the process of doing so. "Oh my gosh I'm so sorry!" you laugh as you jokingly hold his face. The amount of sleep you've had has drained you. It was 5am at this point so there was no point in going to sleep when you got to your villa.

~

After an hour, you both finally made your way to the villa awaiting you by the beach. "The view is absolutely breathtaking!" Johnny lightly chuckles at you before taking his and your luggage to the villa, leaving you to your own devices. It's as if your in your own world. The sun began to rise and eventually covered the landscape in red. The was the definition of a picture perfect moment. You are so glad that Mr Yamazaki suggested you do this.

"Y/N! Come and help me unpack!" Your fantasy was unfortunately cut short by the sound of Johnnys voice echoing. "Oh yes... uhm sure!" You quickly ran inside.

Unpacking took so long. Too long. It was eventually lunch time by the time everything was done. You both thought it would be great to get lunch out. This was a good chance to have a nice chat with him.

You took to lunch at a local restaurant. Johnny looked rather nice as he wore jeans and a suit shirt and you wore a nice mini dress. Over lunch you discussed details about his work and what he used to do and why he did it. This would soon help with the investigation, but he weren't to know this. Then came the inevitable questions about your job. You answered these types of questions in order for Johnny to trust you. Lunch soon turned into dinner at the same place as you both had doubtably good chemistry with each other as there was nothing you didn't talk about. It was true that you spent hours talking and getting to know each other on a personal level. Maybe this wasn't a good idea as it only contributed more to your feelings.

Nighttime fell and there was a sensual atmosphere between the two of you as you both make your way back to the villa. All of a sudden you let go of Johnnys hand, divert from him and make your way to the now cold beach. Johnny follows after you.

You stare out, looking at the final moments of the sun before it sets for the day. You clutch onto your jacket harder as the bitter wind becomes colder as the sun sets. Johnny swiftly wraps his arm around your shoulder and draws you closer into him. You both stare out in amazement. Even after the sun has gone, you both still stand there in each other's arms. No words need to be exchanged between you, the atmosphere alone is enough to signal whatever happens next.

Your head rests softly against Johnnys arm as he swoops down to lightly kiss the top of your head. You smile in content and wanted to make the next move.

"Johnny..." you break away from his embrace to turn to face him. The silence was real. Johnny eventually broke the silence by picking you up bridal style by surprise. "Put me down!! aha!" You laugh, scared that he might throw you in the sea. Luckily he stopped just before the sea began to come in. You both stopped to look at each other, his features became prominent in the bright moonlight. Without thinking, almost as if it was natural, you cupped his face and leaned in to plant a kiss upon his soft lips. It was sweet at first but it soon turned rough. "Johnny..." you breathed his name out as he began to kiss your neck. This could only mean one thing you thought...

You were abruptly placed back on the floor and he quickly intertwined his fingers with yours. "Oh what you do to me Y/N." You were practically dragged back, you were tired as well. You had to cut this night short, unfortunately.

"Uhm, Johnny do you mind if it waits? I am so exhausted after the flight." Just inches from the villa, Johnny turns to you and nods in agreement. "I agree, I was just a bit frisky and a tad bit out of order." You smile back at him. "Thank you." You swiftly slide past him and dibs the shower first.

That kiss could mean one thing...

Could Johnny be catching feelings as well?

[nadziejastar]

The Meaning of Axel’s Upside-Down Tears

Wait, don’t tell me—

Axel checked his reflection in the glass again and looked for the marks. They were gone. The marks under his eyes were missing.

“We’re people again.”

Lea knew he was human again when he realized that the marks under his eyes were gone. They were the symbol of his identity as a Nobody. Since Saïx mentioned them several times in KH3, I’m sure the entire backstory of how he got them was supposed to be very important to their relationship. Lea has the tear marks in his concept art for BBS, and Isa has yellow eyes and pointed ears. I think this was because we were supposed to see the full backstory of how Isa got Norted and how Lea got his tear marks.

Day 356: Unforeseen Events

Author: Saïx

Our plans never accounted for the possibility of both Xion and Roxas leaving. How did this come to pass? When did Roxas grow strong enough to outmuscle me? What were you really after, Lea? We joined the Organization at the same time, and formulated our plan. At this point, it’s just an idle fantasy. Everything changed. You, and me.

This post will be my opinion about Axel’s upside-down tears and what they truly represent. On the day Axel vowed to bring Xion back, Saïx said in his report that he couldn’t understand what Lea was after anymore. They joined the organization at the same time and formulated their plan.

“You both think you can do whatever you want!” He summoned his flame-wreathed chakrams to his hands. “Well, I’m sick of it. Go on, you just keep running. But I’ll always be there to bring you back!”

It was a plea, a cry, a bitter lament, and a vow.

I think this plan was the origin of the tear marks. The upside-down tears represented a plea, a cry, a bitter lament, and a vow.

Roxas was starting to resent the Organization because of Xion. It was an uncomfortable idea, but some of the blame lay with Axel, and he was getting worried that Roxas’s doubts might include him as well.

Axel walked on. He wanted to find Xion before Roxas did—and that was why he had them split up. If he could find her first, maybe he could defuse some of the tension. But how would everyone be satisfied without getting hurt? How could he make that happen? He doubted it was even possible. That didn’t mean he was about to give up, though. He walked on.

When Saïx first ordered Xion to be destroyed, Axel told Roxas to trust him and that he’d think of something clever to fix everything. He really had no idea how to do that, though.

Nomura: It is a fact that Saïx and Axel probably wanted to take over the Organization, however they didn’t understand what they were going to do or how to do it. As for Xemnas, he knew about this betrayal, but never brought it up. Generally, one’s conduct was for the sake of their purpose.

I think Lea’s promise to Isa was probably the same. He vowed to bring him home, but he would need to overthrow the organization in order to do that. And he had no idea how he was going to accomplish that. 

Day 119: Hearts and Emotion

Author: Xaldin

Watching that foolish beast flail about only deepens my disdain for humans and their incessant need to be pinned down by feelings. We became Nobodies precisely to avoid the shackles of emotion. It was only later that we realized the scale of that loss: that some things simply cannot be done without a heart. Nonetheless, I see nary a pleasant thing about it.

Teardrop tattoos are usually associated with prison culture in real life. They often mean that the wearer has killed someone. Others may get such a tattoo to represent sorrow or loss, such as when a loved one is murdered or imprisoned.

Facing Sora like this reminded him of Roxas, which made him uneasy. The memory of a feeling welled up within, something that had never come over him when he confronted Marluxia or Larxene or Vexen.

Since I became a Nobody, I haven’t cared like this about anyone who isn’t connected to memories of my past.

What was happening? Why was Roxas so important to him? Why was Sora? So long as he understood what the stakes were, he should have no reason to recoil from terminating someone. After all, he was a Nobody with no heart. And yet…he didn’t want to do this.

Axel is an assassin, and I think that his teardrops have both of those meanings. Xaldin said that the apprentices became Nobodies to avoid the shackles of emotion. I think Lea chose to join the organization for that exact same reason, though his motivations were entirely different from the apprentices. 

Saïx: There’s something I’ve meant to ask.

Xemnas: About Axel? The poor fool. How long will he keep chasing the illusion of friendship, when he himself lacks emotion? Trying so hard to retrieve what he has lost, when it may never have existed in the first place. He deserves nothing more than our pity.

I don’t think Axel was as much of a hostage of the organization as Saïx was. He felt tempted to leave all the time whenever he thought about how much Saïx had changed. He wasn’t afraid to let Naminé escape or interfere when Roxas and Xion were going to destroy each other. Xemnas was never very harsh with Axel when he would meddle. I think he could have escaped if he really wanted to. Xemnas had a greater purpose for Saïx, Roxas and Xion to be there.

“Did you take care of Axel?” Xigbar asked.

“Most likely,” Saïx replied. Technically, he hadn’t seen Axel’s end. But it was hard to imagine that he had survived.

“Are you certain he’s gone?” Xaldin demanded. “He’ll be back to cause more trouble if you didn’t eliminate him.”

Xemnas put a stop to the interrogation. “Leave Axel for the time being.”

“What about the Keyblade wielder?” Saïx asked Demyx, hoping to turn the conversation away from himself.

But he didn’t act like he minded very much when Axel left. As long as he didn’t come back and cause problems, Xemnas couldn’t have cared less what he did. 

Day 71: The Traitors' End

Author: Xigbar

Saïx had a hand in what went down at Castle Oblivion—well, more like a whole arm. Which means Axel was in on it as well. It's a fact that Xemnas ordered Axel to take out the traitors, orders which went through Saïx. No specific names were given, but naturally Xemnas knew who the turncoats were right from the get-go.

Xigbar and Xaldin encouraged Saïx to eliminate Axel apparently for their own personal reasons. On Day 71, Xigbar wrote in his report that he knew Saïx and Axel were responsible for half of their members getting wiped out. 

“Yeah, well, about those unplanned terminations…” Xigbar kept a level stare trained on him. “I have to wonder if this involves you-know-who.”

“Whether or not that is true, we have at least two Keyblades at our disposal,” said Xemnas. “Which means the plan is proceeding smoothly. There is no need to alter it simply because of a decrease in numbers.”

With that, he turned back to his documents and resumed scribbling. Xigbar only shrugged and disappeared from the room.

In the novel, he brings the issue up with Xemnas on Day 71. But Xemnas didn’t care. This was a personal issue Xigbar had. Xemnas said Axel deserved nothing more than PITY when he left. It didn’t sound like he was even interested in seeking him out to punish him. That’s how pathetic Xemnas found him.

“Axel this, Axel that… Sounds like you’re thick as thieves.” Xigbar restlessly jiggled his crossed legs. “Makes me wonder what you two are up to.”

“I might wonder the same about you,” Saïx retorted, and the tension was so thick it was hard to breathe.

“We have but one objective,” said Xemnas. “Be sure to keep that in mind.”

Personally, I think Xigbar and Xaldin were envious of Axel’s devotion to Saïx. They took satisfaction in Saïx hunting Axel down as a traitor because they believed that love is a weakness and it eventually withers and dies. But Xemnas seemed to view Axel as nothing but a pitiful kid who devoted his whole life to a lost cause. He knew that from the very beginning, Axel was only there for only one reason---to get his best friend back.

“Yeah, well, now I’m betraying them.”

Xemnas began chuckling at Axel’s overconfident declaration. “Heh-heh… Heh-heh-heh…”

“Xemnas…?” Xigbar frowned nervously. But he didn’t stop laughing. Xigbar and Saïx looked at each other.

“Very well.” Finally, Xemnas stifled his laughter, though he still sounded intensely amused. “You’re reinstated into the organization.”

In the novel, Axel actually went back to the organization when he was planning to rescue Kairi, and Xemnas saw right through his act. He found it so hilarious he was laughing hysterically and just said okay. Xigbar and Saïx just looked at each other, obviously creeped out. To Xemnas, Axel was just a worthless pawn that had been already been knocked off the board. He wasn’t the least bit threatened by him. Lea didn’t even have his own chess piece on Xehanort’s board in KH3. That’s how insignificant of a player he was.

Xigbar: The house is looking pretty empty, huh? I thought I'd get a little enjoyment watching Axel throw one last tantrum, but he went a lot quieter than I thought.

Xehanort paid so little attention to him, it might be why Lea was able to catch him off guard to rescue Sora in KH3D. Xigbar said he wasn’t supposed to be there, so they weren’t expecting him. Lea was simply not on Xehanort’s radar. In my view, Lea joined the organization by choice. It’s not like he wanted to join or anything. But he wasn’t forced into it. Xehanort didn’t need him. He volunteered to join. And he stayed of his own free will. I think this is why he wouldn’t take off the black coat in KH3. He refused to leave the organization until he kept his promise to bring Isa back.

The blue-haired man had been the very first to join the organization after the founding members. He should have been special. The way number 13—Roxas, wielder of the Keyblade—was special. Axel was not. And yet…

Isa was a different story. Saïx thought he should have been special like Roxas was, and he said Axel was not special. I think this was referring to the fact that Isa was Subject X, the unique specimen who Xehanort wanted as his vessel.

The Beast had a ferociously strong heart—its strength of will alone had taken him to Hollow Bastion to save one of the princesses, Belle.

“Looks strong,” Axel remarked from behind them.

“Yeah. He is,” Riku said, sinking into thought. His heart is even stronger than his body. It’s exactly the kind of heart the organization wants…

“But someone that strong won’t just do whatever the organization says,” Naminé murmured.

“Well, this is their chance to show how persuasive they can be,” Axel said with a bitter smirk.

I think Isa was planning to end his life because he knew he was going to be forced to lose his heart and join the organization. He couldn’t defy his fate, since he was branded with the Recusant’s Sigil. 

“Why would caring about something be a weakness?” Xion asked, baffled.

Roxas lowered his head. “I don’t know. I didn’t get it, either.”

I’m not the only one surrounded by things I can’t understand, Xion thought. Axel would explain it, though…

Caring about Lea was his weakness. Xehanort probably threatened to harm Lea if Isa didn’t do what he said. Isa was trying to protect Lea. And that’s why Axel always felt such loyalty to Saïx and why it was so hard to reconcile his memories of the past with Saïx’s personality. 

“But this is for everyone’s sake.”

Everyone…? Who do you mean by everyone? Us? Or others?

“Don’t say selfish crap like that. Every last one of…”

“This is for the best,” Xion said.

I hate that sort of thing. There’s no such this as ‘this is for the best’. There’s, I want to, and I don’t want to, that’s all. I learned that in my human time.

Isa didn’t want to become an emotionless slave doing Xehanort’s dirty work for the rest of his life, and he didn’t want Lea to be used as a bargaining chip, either. He thought dying was truly the best thing he could do for everyone. That way, he wouldn’t become a puppet, and Lea would be free. That was his final decision. Lea was crying that day. He was totally heartbroken, but also angry.

Kairi looked up at him then. “Aren’t you…a bad guy?”

“I’m not,” Axel replied, completely serious. “But not really a good guy, either.”

He hated that his best friend had no choice but to sacrifice himself to do what was “right”. Lea couldn’t accept that outcome. It wasn’t fair or just that Isa was going to taken from him just because it was the most moral thing to do. He wouldn’t let Isa die, no matter what. So, he decided to join the organization along with him. He promised that he’d bring him home, by whatever means necessary.

In order for Sora—no, for Roxas to live, and also for us to accomplish our own goal, Zexion is in the way. And if it’s for the sake of our own goal, we already decided what to do, that time.

Their plan was to take over the organization together, so Isa could finally be free. Lea didn’t know how they were gonna take over, but he’d figure something out. He agreed to do whatever icky jobs Xehanort wanted him to do and he became the organization’s ruthless assassin.

I did it with the best of intentions, that’s all. For Roxas’s sake, for Xion’s sake, for the Organisation’s sake—and for Isa’s sake. But more than anything, for my own sake.

He wanted to do all the dirty work because he knew that Isa morally objected to it. This might be why Lea was allowed to join the organization, even though Xemnas knew all along that he was planning to betray him. If Lea joined, Isa would be more compliant and easier to control. Saïx wouldn’t go berserk or try to commit suicide. Having Axel around was convenient.

“Everything is back to normal. Of course this is for the best, isn’t it?”

The reason I’m unable to answer Saïx is probably because I depend on him, thought Axel.

“Xemnas has also been irritated at the recent changes in plan. Everything has to go back to normal, for the sake of our goal too… Lea.”

Axel’s motivations were clear, so his actions were predictable. Xemnas trusted him to take care of the traitors in Castle Oblivion. He was quite good at his job. He always merciless in carrying out his orders. Xemnas didn’t need him around, but he never viewed him as a threat, either. So, he was a useful asset despite his disloyalty.

I’ll bring them back no matter how many times it takes. No matter how many times. For my own sake, for your sakes. No matter how strong Xion tries to make her power, I don’t think I’ll lose. Because I’m strong.

When Lea formed his plan, he didn’t care about morality. He gave up caring about what was right or wrong or being a good person. All he cared about was getting what he wanted, which was Isa. My theory is that the upside-down tears represent Lea’s decision to become a Nobody and embracing it. He would willingly sacrifice his heart, his emotions, and and his morality, for Isa’s sake.

I use the Organization for myself. That hasn’t changed from the start. All that’s changed is for whose sake I do it for. Maybe he’d call it being a traitor. But the world changes.

When Axel kidnapped Kairi, the manga did a close up on his tear mark when she asked what he wanted her help with. I definitely think that was a hint about the meaning of the tear marks. He told Kairi he needed help getting his best friend back and he had very bad intentions for how she was going to “help” him. He knew it was wrong, but he was going to do it anyways.

“You’re letting yourself get too attached to them.” 

“Right, sir, of course, sir.” Saïx spun on his heels. That was all he wanted to say to me? 

But just as Saïx started walking away, he caught a barely audible murmur—“You’ve changed.” 

He listened to Saïx’s receding footsteps, and his gaze dropped to his own feet. “You sure I’m the one who changed?” he said under his breath.

Axel was always prepared to do whatever it took to get Isa back. He lived that way for a very long time. He never doubted himself until he began to realize how much Isa had changed. 

If Xemnas’s plan remained unchanged, then so would his. Still, Saïx saw a potential wrench in the works—Axel and his patently obvious doubts. It might have been a mistake to let him get so close to Roxas and Xion. Saïx let out a rather human sigh and vanished from the room.

Then, his emotions started interfering. He began to feel empathy for people like Roxas, Xion, Sora and Kairi. He had a lot in common with them and could understand how they felt.

“There’s something I want to look into. So I figured I should probably ask you first.”

“Hmph. I’m sure you’ll look into whatever you want with or without my permission.”

The upside-down tears also meant Lea decided he was done crying like a helpless child. I think this exchange probably represented Lea and Isa’s relationship as humans rather well. It happened the day after Axel told Saïx to shut his mouth. Axel wanted to go to Castle Oblivion and asked Saïx for permission. Saïx knew he would just do whatever he wanted to, regardless of what he said.

Saïx stared at him hard. “Fine. You have permission to enter the lab. I’ll have an underling bring you the key.”

“Perfect. Glad that didn’t take too long. Now I can get to work.”

“Somehow, I doubt the scope of your investigation will be confined to work.” Saïx’s mouth curved into the approximate shape of a smile.

“…Guilty as charged,” Axel drawled. “How much do you wanna know?”

“Nothing. Do what you want.”

Taking those words at face value, Axel waved at him and promptly left. He wondered absentmindedly whether Saïx would have granted permission for something like this to any of the other members. Even now, did Saïx still trust him?

Saïx wasn’t born yesterday. He knew Axel wanted to know about Xion and would look for information about her behind his back. He called him out on this later. But he still gave him permission to go. He trusted that Axel had his best interests in mind and let him do whatever he wanted. Saïx trusted Axel, and he never wanted to betray that trust.

“Sounds like you’re the one who’s so interested in Castle Oblivion. Don't try and dress it up as a favor.” He stepped forward and past Saïx, out of his line of sight. “Let me guess… That chamber will tell you everything you want to know about Xemnas’s true agenda. Is that about the size of it?”

I think “the plan” Lea and Isa formulated was for them both to join the organization. Isa really didn’t want to join, so Lea promised to carry out whatever orders he didn’t want to do. Saïx was more than happy to give Axel orders to eliminate people. He wasn’t worried about him while he was at Castle Oblivion, but he had no problem using him like a tool and taking advantage if his loyalty and willingness to get his hands dirty. This is why Axel started to feel resentful. Saïx was always completely on board with the plan to take over the organization.

“Your friend’s… wishes…” Roxas had to ponder that.

So, even if you mean for something to be for your friend’s sake, their wishes are still more important?

But I definitely don’t think Isa was on board with the plan. I don’t think he ever wanted Lea to give up his heart. And he never would have asked for Lea to do all the dirty work, especially for his sake.

“I guess you can’t just jump in and do everything for them, even if you want to.”

Axel leaned his head to one side. “Your friend’s wishes, huh…”

It feels like I have heard that before, a long time ago, when I was human.

But Lea didn’t care what Isa wanted and didn’t listen to him. He forcefully asserted his will over him and wouldn’t let him make his own decision.

“I’ll bring him back to our side. Let me—”

“That’s enough.” Saïx turned his head, giving Axel a sidelong look over his shoulder. “Traitor.” Axel scowled darkly.

“I’m going. You know, don’t you, that you won’t stop me except by force? And even if you tried, you would fail.” Saïx went on his way. Memories informed him that he hated this kind of thing.

It was as much for his own sake as it was for Isa’s sake. Lea wasn’t as self-sacrificing as Isa was. He was doing it for himself because he couldn’t bear to lose Isa. Lea probably forced Isa to join the organization, which might have been when Isa’s mind fragmented and he went to the Realm of Sleep. This might be another reason that Lea was allowed to join.  

“The true goal behind Xemnas—and Xehanort—forming the Organisation was to take all the empty husks that had been made to throw away their hearts, and use Kingdom Hearts to plant the same heart and mind into them,” Xigbar said from behind Sora, who turned to look at him.

Husks that had been made to throw away their hearts—in other words, they were going to plant another heart into those who couldn’t bear the pain…? Or, did they actually do that?

The one thing that caused Axel the most pain was realizing how much Isa changed. Well, Axel changed after losing his heart, too. He was ruthless and motivated only by self-interest. And I think this is what Isa was so afraid of. He didn’t want Lea to change from the kindhearted person who helped stray puppies. Isa couldn’t bear the pain of Lea sacrificing his heart and giving himself over to darkness, for his sake.

A wish that they could always be together—was longing for the impossible. But at least they could always remember one another.

Lea wished he and Isa could stay together forever, talking, laughing, and eating ice cream. That was all he wanted. It was that simple. 

I wanted us to stay together. All I wanted was to hold on to our happiness as a trio in the Organization. But I told myself to grow up and stop wishing for the impossible. Well, I’m done with that. That’s not the answer I want.

He refused to “grow up” and accept that it was impossible. He vowed he would bring Isa back, even if he had to drag him. In a way, he was like a kid throwing a tantrum.

“I’ll always be there to bring you back…,” Lea muttered with a grin as he panted. 

It was a wish—an oath, a promise. I’ll bring you back as many times as it takes. I’ll always be there. For my sake and for both of yours.

Lea didn’t respect Isa’s decision. Losing him was not what he wanted, and that was all that mattered. The marks under his eyes meant that he was taking matters into his own hands. He would never let go of his wish, so he wouldn’t need to cry anymore. 

“Well, we probably can’t be together forever,” Hayner said. “But isn’t that just part of growing up? What’s important isn’t how much we see one another. It’s how often we think about one another. Right?”

It’s why Saïx acted like the marks were something Lea “grew out of” in KH3. 

He stretched backward and rocked the chair back and forth, like a restless child. Naminé returned to her sketchbook.

“Say, Naminé… Are you still going to try to meet Kairi?” Her head snapped up at the unexpected question. Across from her, Axel met her gaze, grave and earnest.

“I have to help her,” she said with a sad smile.

He scowled. “Is that really the best thing?”

“The best thing…?” Naminé set her crayons down on the table, her gaze dropping as she thought for a moment, and then she smiled at him again. “It’s the right thing.”

In response, Axel only leaned back and rocked in the chair again. She took up her crayons. No one could know what was right or wrong.

They represented his attachment to a childish, impossible dream.

“…You’re sure this is for the best?”

Saïx finally turned his face to Axel at those words. “For you to say such a thing out loud…,” he said.

Such a thing—well, that was one way of referring to the buzzing doubt in his chest.

The teardrops represented Axel’s resolve. Saïx was absolutely right. Axel did change.

“Do you guys think we’ll always be together like this?” Pence said out of nowhere.

“I sure hope so,” Olette replied, as if she’d been wondering the same.

“Huh?” Hayner was mystified. “Where’d that come from?”

“Oh, um, you know… Just thinking out loud.” Pence bit into his ice cream bar.

When he first joined the organization, he vowed he would do whatever it took for him and Isa to stay together forever. Without a heart, he thought he would never have any doubt or inner conflict about what he needed to do to make this wish come true.

“We don’t have any place to run.” Xion shook her head.

Yes, we can, Roxas wanted to say. We’ll get away somehow.

But it wasn’t true.

“I know,” he mumbled. “I was just thinking out loud.”

He never expressed any kind of uncertainty about his actions, which is why Saïx was so surprised when he voiced his doubts over Xion. It wasn’t like Axel to question whether something was “for the best”. 

It shouldn’t make any difference to him or to the Organization whether Naminé lived or not. He would destroy anyone in his way.

The old Axel would destroy anything or anyone in his way. 

“You’ve lost sight of the light within the darkness. And it seems that you’ve forgotten that you forgot.”

“The light within the darkness…,” Sora murmured, as if it reminded him of something.

Axel seized on that. “You want me to give you a hint?”

I think Isa was probably Lea’s light within the darkness during the experiments. 

Yes, Axel was now truly flesh and blood, which meant that the idea of losing himself to the darkness frightened him. Still, he needed the power of darkness to open these corridors. Without it, he wouldn’t be able to travel from Radiant Garden to other worlds. The darkness in his heart gave him that power, and he had at least enough for this. Was any human truly free of darkness in their heart? Wasn’t that the nature of sadness and regret?

Lea could open dark corridors, even as a human. He admitted this was due to the darkness within his heart. He wasn’t reluctant to rely on the power of darkness. And he was a victim of experiments on the darkness of the heart, after all. Or at least, that is the backstory that makes the most sense for him.

After Riku’s devastating blow, Saïx got slowly to his feet. “Nothing less from the great Ansem—that’s what I should say, isn’t it? Or maybe—”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about! I’m protecting those islands!” Riku rushed into range, but this time the Claymore, Saïx’s sword, was there to block Soul Eater.

“How do you expect to protect anything when you’ve cloaked yourself in darkness? You sold your soul for power. Was it worth it?”

Isa was the reason Lea never fully gave in to the darkness. Even Saïx seemed disgusted with using the power of darkness to protect anything. This is probably due to Isa’s memories of the experiments.

Now then, how best to guide Terra into becoming his vessel? The fierce light in Terra’s heart also empowered the darkness within him. The stronger the light, the deeper the shadow, and that would be Terra’s path into the darkness.

Like Terra, maybe Isa’s powerful light was the reason he was such a unique subject who was targeted to become a vessel. 

Vexen let out a howl of anguish, though it was only a moment before flames consumed him and he vanished entirely. Nobodies, it seemed, left nothing behind when they were snuffed out.

“What are you—? What are you people?!” Sora demanded.

“Hmm. Not sure. I wonder about that myself.” With that, Axel disappeared himself.

I think that, without Isa around, Axel wandered down a very dark path. He held a lot of hatred inside of him and the tear marks were a symbol of that. The reason Axel changed is because Saïx changed. That gave him the opportunity to find the right path on his own, becoming a Guardian of Light. It was necessary character development for him. He needed to rediscover who he really was.

“…You planning to get in the way again?” said Saïx.

Axel kept his eyes averted. “In the way of what? Of who?” he asked.

“In the way of us. I trust you.”

Axel cracked a dry smile. “You say that exactly like you would if you had a heart.”

“My memories of the time I did have one are making it so, that’s all. If you get in the way any further, though, the memories I have since becoming a Nobody will overwrite them.”

“…That sounds like a threat.”

“It’s quite similar. Think good and hard about it,�� Saïx said in closing, and walked away. Axel stood there, rooted to the spot.

On the morning Saïx gave Roxas the mission in Halloween Town, he and Xion were supposed to fight until one of them destroyed the other. Saïx told Axel he trusted him, and Axel seemed like he remembered Isa telling him the same thing. I think Isa did tell Lea that he trusted him when he vowed he’d always be there to bring him back. Saïx was reminding him of that.

“It seems you chose the selfish course of action. Our plan does not require two of them. You understand this, don’t you? One is plenty.”

When you say ‘we,’ who do you mean? Axel wanted to ask suddenly, giving a bitter smile instead. We—Is ‘we’ the Organization itself? Or is ‘we’ just Saïx and me? I don’t really know any more.

“Think good and hard about it.”

I am thinking. I’m thinking so hard that I’m sick of it. I’m thinking so hard that I just want you to tell me the answer. He wanted to tell him so, but Saïx had already started walking towards the lobby.

It’s just like that back is rejecting me. And, I’m realizing that my memories of the past are too different from the thoughts I’m having now. Why the hell am I here? I don’t really know any more. What the hell do I want to do?

But Axel went against Saïx’s wishes and disappointed him. Their roles had reversed from when they were humans. Isa never would have wanted Lea to sacrifice his heart for him. He never would have asked him to kill innocent people for his sake. And he never would have wanted him to give himself over to darkness. He wanted to sacrifice himself because he wanted Lea to be free from the darkness. That selflessness is exactly why Lea wanted to save him so badly in the first place. Lea was “selfish” for acting on his own whims and refusing to do what was “for the best”.

Axel’s eyes crinkled as he remembered his own best friend—the only friend he’d ever had, in fact.

“If your best friend goes away, you’re sad, and if you get to be with them, you’re happy,” Naminé added. “Isn’t that how it is, Axel?”

“…That’s about the size of it.” Axel nodded and sat down on the remaining empty sofa, staring at the sea-salt ice cream he held.

“So you are capable of sincerity,” said Riku. Axel only shrugged at the jab and finished his ice cream pop.

On the other hand, Saïx considered Axel “selfish” because he didn’t want two innocent children to be destroyed for the sake of their goal. He didn’t care about anyone but himself. Axel no longer recognized him. The fact that Axel shed tears in KH2FM+ was a huge deal. The upside-down tears were supposed to mean he was done with crying. He never wanted to be put in a situation where he’d have to cry like he did when Isa almost sacrificed himself. Never again. But even after abandoning his morals and giving up his heart, he still felt like he lost his best friend and failed to bring him back. It was very sad, actually.

[thebluelemontree]

SanSan time! So in ASOIAF we get the Hand’s Tourney scene with Sansa & Sandor, and the whole “he was no true knight” moment. It seems like Sandor is still thinking she’s just a “little bird” here - but later, her father as Hand attaints Gregor, stripping him of his titles for his violent crimes. How do you think this makes Sandor feel about Sansa & his perceived seriousness of her moral ideals, considering his trauma re: Gregor being anointed and his other crimes covered up by everyone but Ned?

I don’t think Sandor was ready at the time to draw any positive conclusions between Sansa and her father, because his cynicism always gets in the way of that.  While her compassion made him take notice, he doesn’t regard her beliefs as a good thing.  To him, they are still woefully naive and a weakness that will only lead to being victimized by the strong and cruel.  If Sansa is so ill-prepared for the brutality and bleakness of reality, well, he would point a very judgemental finger at her parents for that.  This is not to say Sandor wasn’t quietly making observations about Ned, because I do think a few books in we see subtle indications that Ned’s character and decision to bring Gregor to justice perhaps did make an impression after all.  And I think it’s his experience with Sansa that causes him to have a more charitable conception of Ned in hindsight rather than Ned influencing his view of Sansa.         

It’s just that Sandor requires a lot of evidence over time before he will consider altering his opinions.  He sees exactly what he expects to see, so his point of view is always validated.  It takes more than just Sansa saying “he was no true knight,” as groundbreaking as that moment was.  It’s precisely that fact that makes him want to work harder at trying to find the cracks in Sansa’s idealism to prove that it can’t be real.  It’s only until the conclusion of the Blackwater scene that Sandor can finally accept that she is sincere in her beliefs by treating him with compassion when he least deserved it.  To him, Sansa is such an anomaly that the idea of anyone else being that authentic and principled is an even bigger stretch of the imagination than she is.   

And what experience does Sandor have with fathers doing right by their children?  None.  His own father covered up Gregor’s vicious attack and made him uphold the lie.  Then he’s a witness to Tywin and Robert Baratheon’s parenting.  Sandor always initially gives his life experiences more weight than any counterevidence he saw from Ned or Sansa.        

We are given a glimpse of Sandor’s reaction upon hearing the news that Beric Dondarrion was sent by Ned to put down Gregor Clegane through Littlefinger:  

Robert was in a fury [over the loss of the white hart], until he heard talk of some monstrous boar deeper in the forest. Then nothing would do but he must have it. Prince Joffrey returned this morning, with the Royces, Ser Balon Swann, and some twenty others of the party. The rest are still with the king.“

“The Hound?” Ned asked, frowning. Of all the Lannister party, Sandor Clegane was the one who concerned him the most, now that Ser Jaime had fled the city to join his father.

“Oh, returned with Joffrey, and went straight to the queen.” Littlefinger smiled. “I would have given a hundred silver stags to have been a roach in the rushes when he learned that Lord Beric was off to behead his brother.”

“Even a blind man could see the Hound loathed his brother.”

“Ah, but Gregor was his to loathe, not yours to kill. Once Dondarrion lops the summit off our Mountain, the Clegane lands and incomes will pass to Sandor, but I wouldn’t hold my water waiting for his thanks, not that one… “  – Eddard XII AGOT

Granted Littlefinger is framing this information in a certain light to pique Ned’s paranoia as he’s been doing throughout their interactions.  Ned just tipped his hand as to who he’s worried about and Littlefinger ran with it, making it seem like Ned just crossed Sandor personally.  Early on, Sandor is still invested in the idea that killing his brother is the only way to end the pain of his trauma.  Not that I think that he genuinely wants to be a kinslayer, but keeping the revenge fantasy alive is a coping mechanism that Sandor doesn’t want to be taken from him.  I have no doubt that Sandor did go to Cersei immediately to discuss the situation, but there’s a lot more going on here.  This is going to be a long recap and a good deal of rambling.  You have been forewarned. 

At the inn at the crossroads, Catelyn arrests Tyrion as a person of interest in the assassination attempt on Bran based on Littlefinger’s claim of who won the Valyrian steel dagger.  She takes Tyrion to Lysa in the Eyrie, holding him prisoner.  Word of Tyrion’s arrest reaches King’s Landing via Yoren.  In retaliation, Jaime Lannister and his men attack Ned Stark in the streets, leaving Ned with a badly broken leg.  Ned is unconscious with a fever for “six days and seven nights.”  When he awakens, he tries to speak to Robert about the conflict with the Lannisters, but Robert will not hear of it.  The situation is escalating with both Riverrun and Casterly Rock calling their banners in anticipation for war.  Robert decides he’d rather go hunting than deal with this mess, tells Ned they should just simply stop fighting and leaves the next day.  Thanks, Robert.  

Ned is back to holding court as Hand and dealing with official business.  Marq Piper and Karyl Vance, Hoster Tully’s bannermen, show up to accuse the Lannisters of sending Gregor Clegane to attack villages in the Riverlands under the guise of common brigands.  They brought with them the few remaining survivors of the attacks to testify that despite the lack of sigils or banners, these brigands were definitely outfitted like proper knights.  They had war horses, good weapons and armor, and their inhumanly large leader couldn’t be anyone else other than the Mountain.  Ned believes them and suspects what Tywin may be trying to accomplish:  “should Riverrun strike back [openly attacking Tywin’s soldiers or bannermen], Cersei and her father would insist that it had been the Tullys who broke the king’s peace, not the Lannisters. The gods only knew what Robert would believe.”  The ruse gives Tywin plausible deniability of being responsible, but it is flimsy enough so the Riverlanders to take the bait.  There’s no guarantee that Robert, the weak king that he is, wouldn’t cave under pressure to side with his in-laws.  We also learn later that Tywin was counting on Ned leading his forces personally to come to the aid of his wife’s family.  Away from King’s Landing, Ned could be killed, captured, or traded for Tyrion.  Either way, the Starks would be removed from power; however, Ned’s leg was broken during the street fight with Jaime, who knew nothing of his father’s plan.  

So Ned sends Beric Dondarrion to bring down Ser Gregor for his crimes against the villagers in the name of the king’s justice, thwarting Tywin’s provocation of Riverrun to retaliate.  By putting Robert’s stamp of approval on Gregor’s death sentence, he’s also gambling that this will position the king to side against his in-laws later.  You know, when he finally gets Robert to have that big talk about his wife and kids.  Sigh. 

“Lord Tywin is greatly wroth about the men you sent after Ser Gregor Clegane,” the maester confided. “I feared he would be. You will recall, I said as much in council.”

“Let him be wroth,” Ned said. Every time his leg throbbed, he remembered Jaime Lannister’s smile, and Jory dead in his arms. “Let him write all the letters to the queen he likes. Lord Beric rides beneath the king’s own banner. If Lord Tywin attempts to interfere with the king’s justice, he will have Robert to answer to. The only thing His Grace enjoys more than hunting is making war on lords who defy him.” – Eddard XII, AGOT.

Ned sends Ser Robar Royce to Robert’s hunting party to inform the king (and Yohn Royce) of Dondarrion’s posse and Gregor’s attainment/death sentence.  Fast forward to Robert on his deathbed, where he voices his displeasure with Ned putting him in a difficult spot with his wife’s family.  

“Ah, fuck you, Ned,” the king said hoarsely. “I killed the [boar], didn’t I?” A lock of matted black hair fell across his eyes as he glared up at Ned. “Ought to do the same for you. Can’t leave a man to hunt in peace. Ser Robar found me. Gregor’s head. Ugly thought. Never told the Hound. Let Cersei surprise him.” His laugh turned into a grunt as a spasm of pain hit him. – Eddard XIII, AGOT.

Robert admits to Ned that he never told Sandor himself.  Surprise, Robert dodged an uncomfortable conversation and intended on leaving that task to Cersei so he could get back to having a good time.  Because Sandor returned with Joffrey and the Royces, he most definitely heard the news through them.  Why does this detail matter?  Well, if you were Sandor, wouldn’t you be irked that the king didn’t have the basic courtesy (or balls) to tell you himself?  The natural progression of that conversation would be discussing what that means for Sandor’s future, the inheritance of Clegane lands, and his standing with the Lannisters during this conflict.  But Robert doesn’t want to touch that topic with a ten-foot pole.  What I’m saying is, at that moment, he’s probably more pissed at Robert than anyone else.  Following that would be Ned’s decision interfering with one of his primary coping mechanisms.  So Sandor marches off straight to Cersei where he was probably told of Gregor’s purpose in the Riverlands and assured that Ned’s order would come to nothing.  Indeed, Gregor was ready for Donddarion, ambushing his party from all sides at Mummer’s Ford, soundly defeating them.  Meanwhile, Cersei was already making moves to remove both Ned and Robert.  But how did Sandor feel about all this? 

The grey light of dawn was streaming through his window when the thunder of hoofbeats awoke Eddard Stark from his brief, exhausted sleep. He lifted his head from the table to look down into the yard. Below, men in mail and leather and crimson cloaks were making the morning ring to the sound of swords, and riding down mock warriors stuffed with straw. Ned watched Sandor Clegane gallop across the hard-packed ground to drive an iron-tipped lance through a dummy’s head. Canvas ripped and straw exploded as Lannister guardsmen joked and cursed.

Is this brave show for my benefit, he wondered. If so, Cersei was a greater fool than he’d imagined. Damn her, he thought, why is the woman not fled? I have given her chance after chance … – Eddard XIV AGOT

He’s right there under Ned’s window, mocking and intimidating him.  If there was any tiny glimmer in Sandor that maybe Gregor would be finally held accountable for any of his crimes, it was almost immediately overshadowed by his cynicism and confirmation bias.  Knowing that Ned’s goose is cooked, Sandor would think Ned a great, naive fool for not understanding how the world really works and how outmatched he is.  His worldview is validated yet again by the cunning of his masters.  The only thing he can do is attempt to cure Sansa of the same infirmity before its too late for her. 

Just before the Blackwater battle, Sandor brings up her father and tries to put some dents in his image to argue his points.  For a little context, Sandor was alone on the roof of the Red Keep until Sansa showed up.  We can infer with his anxieties about the wildfire that Sandor was up there contemplating his own mortality, which is why he goes so particularly hard in needling Sansa.  It seems as if Sandor must have been in the middle of some pretty intense brooding.  If he dies in the battle by fire no less, it is in the thankless service of awful people, and Gregor still goes on living and unpunished.  If this is how it all ends, well, it’s pretty depressing and of course, as he should have always expected.  And here Sansa is still insisting on her idealistic worldview. He goes for a low blow.  In that process, he reveals his anger and trust issues with fathers.   

She hated the way he talked, always so harsh and angry. “Does it give you joy to scare people?”

“No, it gives me joy to kill people.” His mouth twitched. “Wrinkle up your face all you like, but spare me this false piety. You were a high lord’s get. Don’t tell me Lord Eddard Stark of Winterfell never killed a man.”

“That was his duty. He never liked it.”

“Is that what he told you?” Clegane laughed again. “Your father lied. Killing is the sweetest thing there is.” He drew his longsword. “Here’s your truth. Your precious father found that out on Baelor’s steps. Lord of Winterfell, Hand of the King, Warden of the North, the mighty Eddard Stark, of a line eight thousand years old … but Ilyn Payne’s blade went through his neck all the same, didn’t it? Do you remember the dance he did when his head came off his shoulders?” – Sansa IV, ACOK.

Of course, Ned must be a liar because his father was.  He’s got to be no different than Tywin, the high lord he knows best.  All fathers and killers are the same.  This is the truth as he sees it:  those on top, who hold near-godlike power of life and death over their subjects, secretly enjoy exercising that power behind a virtuous countenance.  Does Sandor honestly believe this about Ned, or is he trying really hard to convince himself of that?  Because for a flickering moment there, it almost sounds like a part of Sandor thinks of Ned in a grand, larger-than-life image before he pauses in thought…  

And since he’s the one who brought up Ned and his execution, he also can’t deny that he witnessed a man condemning himself as a traitor in exchange for the safety of the daughter the Lannisters held hostage.  He did the very thing his own father would not do:  endure the public shame and stigma for love of his child.  That is proof that Ned’s honor wasn’t just about his public image, which surely didn’t go unnoticed by someone sensitive to such things, whether he was ready to accept that or not.  That Ned wasn’t just merely outmatched by more cunning players, he was the victim of treachery and deceit, failed by a negligent king uninterested in dealing with corruption.  While he still does think Ned a fool, there’s a sense that Sandor has adjusted to thinking of him as a decent, honorable, and tragic sort of fool, much like his daughter.  What good did that integrity do him?  None.  The monsters won.  Illyn Payne still took his head off while he and his daughter watched.  Did you catch how the detail of Ned’s twitching limbs was burned into Sandor’s memory, the same one that plagued Sansa’s nightmares?  Yeah, it affected him too.  So I do think Sandor is trying to convince himself that Ned was actually a phony and a shitty person because Sandor doesn’t want to empathize with anyone and yet finds himself doing so anyway.  Like with Sansa, caring* means having confused and conflicted feelings that force him to re-examine his own life.  Add to the fact that Sandor is also the child of a murdered father.  I could see a young Sandor having very complicated feelings about mourning his own massive disappointment of a father if he allowed himself to mourn him at all.  I don’t see how those memories could not be dredged up.       

* I’m still debating whether or not “caring” is too strong a word in regards to Ned.  Let’s just say that upon later reflection, I think certain things about Ned’s life and death resonated with Sandor.    

It’s a very small, but not unremarkable shift considering how much of a jaded idealist cynic Sandor is.  Death probably also has a way of memorializing Ned in a similar way to how separation causes Sandor to reframe Sansa’s courteousness as something he highly esteems; however, Sandor just can’t say that he was wrong these things openly, so you have to read between the lines.  Later while telling Arya of his intention to return her to Catelyn and Robb, Sandor says he’s willing to wager that Robb won’t kill him:

If he doesn’t take me, he’d be wise to kill me, but he won’t. Too much his father’s son, from what I hear. – Arya IX, ASOS.

What Sandor is hoping for first and foremost is for Robb to take him into his service, right after stating that he’s done with loathsome and unappreciative masters.  In an indirect way, it is an admission that Ned, Sansa, and the other Starks are not just different, but better.  Still foolish because it would be “wiser” to kill someone like him, but definitely better.  Sandor assumes Robb will be pointing his army toward King’s Landing to free Sansa, so he believes his Lannister intel will make him a valuable asset.  “Maybe I’ll even kill Gregor for him, he’d like that.“  What’s also interesting is that he fantasizes about changing Robb’s negative opinion and winning his favor by taking down Gregor for him (in the name of the king’s justice), essentially fulfilling the duty Ned charged Dondarrion with.  While he may think he’s got one over on Robb and his long-awaited revenge will be the cherry on top, his wording points to a subconscious desire to please and serve Ned through his stand-in eldest son.  That he wants a chance to earn positive recognition from a worthy king, someone who Sansa also loves and admires.  The thought eases the pain of his failures and screw-ups regarding her during the Blackwater.  Except this goes up in smoke with the Red Wedding.  

I don’t know if in the future Sandor will ever have any lines where he openly and positively speaks of Ned, but that would be something I would love to see.  Since I am sure he and Sansa are bound to reunite, it would probably come up then.  Or Ned’s presence could be quietly felt in the continuation of Sandor’s arc through his choices and actions.  Or it could be both.  We just have to wait until Winds to find out.                                                  

[the-desolated-quill]

Look On My Works, Ye Mighty... - Watchmen blog

(SPOILER WARNING: The following is an in-depth critical analysis. if you haven’t read this comic yet, you may want to before reading this review)

Adrian Veidt, aka Ozymandias, is the character we probably know the least about, and some could argue that leaving it until the penultimate chapter to fill in the gaps is leaving it a little late, but as was the case with Doctor Manhattan and Rorschach, it was important that we got to see the character and his impact on the world of Watchmen before we got the full story. Plus I imagine Alan Moore was very hesitant to give us too many details about Veidt in case he ran the risk of revealing his hand too early and spoiling the twist. Look On My Works, Ye Mighty offers many answers to the burning questions throughout the graphic novel whilst offering us a chilling insight into the last remaining superhero archetype that had been unexplored until now. The ‘liberal’ capitalist.

Up until now, we know precisely three things about Veidt. He’s rich, he’s clever and he’s an innovator. It was his subsidiary companies that utilised Manhattan’s superpowers as an alternate energy source, making America eco-friendly and revolutionising technology at the time. He’s also the one superhero in the novel that the general public actually seem to like. Most likely because of his willingness to reveal his secret identity before the Keene Act was passed outlawing superheroes and using his vast wealth and influence to try and help the world instead of merely donning a costume and beating people up. However he’s not popular among other superheroes, most notably Rorschach and the Comedian. With Rorschach, the reasoning is obvious. He’s right wing and homophobic, so naturally he’s at odds with Adrian from the get go. With the Comedian, it’s his cynical nihilism that prevents him from seeing Adrian as anything other than a naive fool with delusions of grandeur. And the dislike is mutual. Adrian openly dislikes Rorschach and, in this very issue, he condemns the Comedian for being Richard Nixon’s lap dog, accusing him of being behind the assassination of JFK and working to keep Nixon in power beyond his term limits (whether this is actually true or simply the conspiratorial ramblings of a bitter liberal is left intentionally unclear). So it’s very ironic indeed that it was the Comedian that gave Adrian the inspiration to fake an alien invasion in the first place.

Now I have a lot to say about the whole alien squid thing, but I’m going to save that for the last review. For now I simply want to focus on Ozymandias himself and the reasons and motivations behind his actions.

So first things first, what’s with the Egyptian imagery? Well Ozymandias is actually the given name for the historical figure known as Alexander the Great, whom Adrian feels a strong kinship towards. It also ties into Adrian’s personality and goals. Obviously there’s the obscene wealth and ridiculously self indulgent architecture, but also the ancient belief that the pharaohs of Ancient Egypt were intermediaries between the gods and mortals. This is important because it gives us an insight into how Adrian views himself and the world around him. Because of his intellect and his wealth, he views himself as being above humanity and only he knows how best to fix the world. However, in the process, he reduces ordinary people to mere statistics. Killing millions of people in one city will bring about world peace and prosperity for the other billions of people around the globe. This line of thinking is called utilitarianism, which basically means that the ends justify the means. Now of course all the characters in Watchmen display elements of utilitarian thinking, but Adrian takes it a step further, applying his own morality to a global scale. It’s scary on a number of levels, but what makes it so frightening for me is what the character of Ozymandias says about other capitalist superheroes like Batman, Green Arrow and Iron Man.

Rich white men becoming costumed vigilantes is nothing new of course. Batman was one of the first comic book superheroes ever conceived after all. But very rarely do we get to see or explore the political and social implications of a superhero being a member of the one percent. If you think about it, ultra rich men putting on costumes and beating up often working class criminals is quite disturbing. Especially when you consider the kinds of things the mega rich get away with in the real world. Money gives you influence and influence gives you power. Costumed crime fighting is in itself an exercise of power over those deemed immoral, but for the capitalist superhero it’s also power over the impoverished and dispossessed. Class privilege in action. This is something that’s hardly ever touched upon in comics. Okay Iron Man comes the closest at points as he was initially created to critique industrialists and war profiteers, and the Civil War storyline paints him in a very ugly light as the Superhuman Registration Act imposed by the government reveals a strong wealth and class divide within the superhero community, but other than that the conversation is usually swept under the rug. 

DC Comics are quick to point out how Batman and Green Arrow aren’t like those rich white men. Look, they’re donating money to orphanages and helping the homeless! They’re nice capitalists! We like those capitalists! As for Marvel, there’s a line even they won’t cross regarding the politics of Iron Man and other such superheroes in their canon. They’re more than happy to discuss how making weapons of mass destruction is bad, but you’ll never see them get too specific. You’ll never see them condemn the American military and the role they’ve played in the destabilisation of the Middle East, nor will you ever see them outright address the distinct possibility that Tony Stark is in fact Republican. This is why I often find the accusation of publishers and movie studios having a quote/unquote ‘political agenda’ so baffling because the truth is they have no agenda other than to make money. Marvel and DC are businesses. They’ll never risk taking a firm stance either way for fear that it will alienate a certain group of readers and lose them sales. But by dodging and skirting around the conversation, the two companies have created an archetype that feels incredibly disingenuous, which is what Watchmen seeks to expose with Ozymandias.

The question is can someone who is ultra rich and influential possibly be heroic? This is something that was briefly touched upon back in A Brother To Dragons with Nite Owl. Dan spent his dad’s inheritance on costumes and gadgets for his superhero alter ego when surely it would have been better to donate the money to charity or something if he truly wanted to help his community. But that’s not what Dan wants. Not really. He just wants to indulge in his own power fantasy. Adrian takes that one step further. He has more money than Dan. Exponentially more. And it can be argued he’s done good things for his community, such as creating renewable energy. However, just like with Dan, the reasoning behind his plot isn’t really down to wanting to help others, but rather as a way of having the ultimate power fantasy. To be seen to be saving the world.

Everything Adrian does is less to do with helping others and more to do with displaying his own power and influence. Don’t get me wrong. I believe that he believes he’s doing the right thing, but if you really scrutinise his actions, his motivations feel far more self serving than he would care to admit. Tricking the world into believing they’re being invaded by an outside force is one thing, but taking the trouble to kidnap multiple scientists, writers and artists in order to create a fake alien seems like overkill. It’s ego driven. If you think about it, a bomb would have done. But Adrian wanted something spectacular. Something memorable. Just look at his decor. He built an entire Egyptian temple and biodome in Antarctica. Why? There’s no reason other than for his own self aggrandisement. It’s a display of his power.

Then there’s his actions regarding the Comedian, Rorschach and Doctor Manhattan. He wanted to get rid of witnesses. Understandable. But why beat the Comedian up so savagely, chucking him from his penthouse window, when he could just as easily have dispatched him with a single gunshot like he did with Moloch? Could it be that silencing the Comedian was less about self preservation and more about Adrian demonstrating his superiority over Nixon’s lap dog? Same goes for Rorschach. Again, he could have just killed him. Would have been much simpler. Instead he frames him for Moloch’s murder. It’s not enough to get rid of Rorschach. He wants the satisfaction of outwitting this right wing sociopath. The manipulation of Doctor Manhattan is self explanatory. Tricking a god into leaving the planet must have been quite the ego boost. And then there’s the fake assassination attempt in Fearful Symmetry. Adrian wanted to deflect suspicion away from him, but like with the alien, he wanted something spectacular. Something memorable.

Every single thing Adrian Veidt does throughout the graphic novel has some sort of egotistical agenda behind it. Even his ultimate plot to stop World War Three and unite the world isn’t about the greater good. It’s about him overcoming his own feelings of powerlessness. Because up until now the one thing he was unable to control with all his wealth and influence was the nukes. Now he’s managed even that. He has succeeded where Alexander the Great failed. He is truly the King of kings.

While not as over the top as this, we’ve seen this kind of behaviour so many times before by members of the quote/unquote liberal elite. Bill Gates, JK Rowling, Joss Whedon, Elon Musk and many more. Wealthy people of influence who are more concerned with looking progressive than actually being progressive. They perform charitable acts not out of a genuine desire to help others, but in order to be seen to be charitable. This is Ozymandias. Like I said, I believe that he believes he’s doing the right thing, but for me I think he’s more interested in being seen to have saved the world rather than actually doing something to truly help bridge the divide between nations. In some ways, he represents superheroes as a whole within Watchmen. Men and women more concerned with the attention and power being a superhero brings than actually helping their community. And just as a superhero alter ego allows the characters to see themselves as being above others, so too does wealth allow Adrian to see himself as being above the world.

This is why it was so important to see all the supporting characters. The news vendor, the kid reading the Black Freighter, Joey and her lesbian partner, Doctor Malcolm Long and his wife, and the two police detectives. To remind us that these are real people’s lives these characters are toying around with here. And it’s genuinely unnerving seeing all these people we’ve come to know over the course of the graphic novel be completely obliterated.

[lechevaliermalfet]

Vae Victis! – A Look Back at Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain

It was the mid-1990s.  We were in the fifth generation of video game consoles, and gaming as a medium was eager to prove that it had grown up.

This had been going on before the fifth generation, of course.  The Sega Genesis sold itself on its contrast to the status quo.  “Sega does what Nintendon’t,” and all that.  Sega’s whole image was bound up in being the cool kid, the one who’d outgrown all those pokey “kiddie” games like Super Mario Bros. or Kid Icarus or Mega Man.  Sega fans played games like Mortal Kombat and Eternal Champions.  Even a mascot game like Sonic the Hedgehog had a kind of snide adolescent streak to it; leaner, meaner, and less patient.   Nintendo themselves had to butch up a little, even.  When their bloodless version of the first Mortal Kombat got outsold by Sega’s, which kept all the gore – despite otherwise being technically superior in every measurable way – they relaxed their standards and left all the blood and fatalities intact for the second and third games, and saw a jump in sales accordingly.  

The 90s were in part a decade of cynicism and ironic detachment.  Sincerity tended to be frowned upon as being kind of silly and naive, or else a cover for motives less savory.  Strong skepticism was the default mode, and in fiction, anti-heroes were all the rage.

Which brings us to Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain, described by its developers as a Legend of Zelda “for adults”.

Of course, any self-described adult who can’t bear to play a Legend of Zelda game because they feel it’s not grown-up enough needs to sit down and re-assess their idea of adulthood, and how secure they are in it.  If a tolerance for violence (if not a craving) is all it takes, then I was an adult at about eleven, when I was single-handedly mowing down whole armies of Nazis in Wolfenstein 3D.

But those were the times, and that’s how Blood Omen got pushed.  Which is unfortunate, because it misses the more thoughtful parts of the game’s story that actually did make it material mostly for adults.

“...the first act in my theatre of Grand Guignol!”

We begin in the world of Nosgoth, and if there’s a made-up fantasy word that screams “dark supernatural fantasy” more than that, I haven’t heard it.  Our main character is Kain, a nobleman caught out at night in a town where he can’t find an inn or tavern to stay for the night.  He is cornered by assassins and murdered, whereupon he goes to hell.  Or at least, we can assume it’s hell; I don’t think even a death metal band’s idea of heaven involves being cuffed to twin posts overlooking a literal lake of fire with a sword stuck through you.  Anyway, that’s where Kain is, cursing the fact that he can’t get revenge.  Which seems a little warped, on the surface of things.  You’d think if you were stuck in hell, then getting out, however impossible, might seem more important than getting back at the people who killed you.  But if you’re the kind of person who winds up in hell after being murdered, I suppose it stands to reason that your priorities may not be in order.

While Kain is in hell, lamenting his impotent rage and generally ignoring all the fine mid-90s CG scenery, he is approached by a necromancer named Mortanius.

The necromancer offers him a way back to the world of the living, and thus a chance at revenge.  Eager to oblige his overdeveloped sense of wrath, Kain takes him up on the offer, and fails to consider that there are only a few different ways, traditionally, that a dead person can cross back through the veil.  And none of them really involve returning to life exactly as you were.

Kain rises from his grave as a vampire, stronger than he ever was in life, and only too happy to hack up his assassins when he encounters them not far from the site of his crypt.  However, as he comes down from his vengeance-high, he hears a voice in the back of his mind – Mortanius’s voice, in fact – suggesting that his assassins were “the instruments of your murder, not the cause”.  Mortanius then urges him to seek out the Pillars to find the real reason for his murder, and its true culprits.

We need to rewind a bit.

IN THE BEGINNING, there were the Pillars of Nosgoth (in fact, “Pillars of Nosgoth” was the game’s working title for a while). Rooted who knows how deep in the earth below, and reaching up to the clouds, the Pillars are a structure that should be physically impossible.  They are somehow both integral to the natural order of the world, and also the embodiment of certain elemental principles. There are nine of them, embodying – in no particular order – conflict, energy, states (of being, not political), dimensions, death, nature, time, the mind, and balance.  Each Pillar has its guardian, a human endowed with powers according to the Pillar’s defining principle, and tasked with overseeing that Pillar’s particular province.  

A good while back in the past (how long is not detailed in this game, but probably centuries) there was a genocidal crusade of sorts against vampires, who were evidently a serious scourge of some kind.  In fact, the game opens on a view of a field – practically a forest – of stakes, with a vampire impaled on each.  Vlad Tepes would be proud.  This crusade was ordered by the Circle of Nine (the collective group of Pillar guardians), and carried out by the fanatical religious order known as the Sarafan Brotherhood.

Monsters that they are, the vampires did not take this well.  One of their number, an elder vampire named Vorador, decided to strike back.  Vorador was by this point in his unlife no longer quite human looking, with mottled grey skin (later series installments would make this varying shades of green), odd three-clawed hands, and giant bat-like ears. Blood Omen never elaborates on the reason for this difference.  At any rate, he singlehandedly stormed the citadel of the Pillar guardians while most of the Sarafan brotherhood were away (presumably looking for more vampires to stake), and wound up killing several of them (one of the sequels gives the number as six).  In the process, he even managed to beat down Malek on his way out, perhaps the greatest warrior among the Sarafan, and the one specifically tasked with safeguarding the Circle.

For screwing up his one job, Malek was punished by being made to do that job for eternity.  It might seem inadvisable to take the guy who failed to guard you and then make him your guard forever, but it helps if you rip his soul out of his body and bind it to his armor, thus making him a sleepless, tireless, unfeeling, and ever vigilant warrior fueled by pure wrath.  Which is what they (or rather, Mortanius) ultimately did.  At some point between this time and the present day of Blood Omen, Malek became the guardian of the Pillar of Conflict, so evidently he was fit for his role in the end.

Now we fast-forward a bit, to a point just moments before Kain’s birth. In fact, later games place this at the exact moment of that birth.

Somewhere around thirty years before Kain’s murder outside a nameless tavern in a random town, Ariel, the guardian of the Pillar of Balance, is murdered.  This is bad news for all the usual reasons, and also one or two unusual ones.  It turns out that her lover is the guardian of the Pillar of the Mind, the mentalist Nupraptor.  Her murder drives him insane, and being a telepath (among other things), his insanity infects the guardians of the other Pillars as well. This turns them from their usual purpose of upholding the natural balance, and instead sets them to destroying it.  This in turn corrupts the Pillars, symbiotically connected to their guardians, turning them from pristine white to a pitted and cracking grey.  With both the Pillars and their guardians respectively corrupted and insane, the natural order of things begins to fall apart.  Bad news all around.

Blood Omen is somewhat unusual in that it’s one of the few probably rare instances in fiction where a woman is stuffed into the fridge at the beginning of the story, and in order to drive the villain to extremes of behavior.

So.

Now we have Kain, in the present of our story, given to understand that his death was in some way connected with the Pillars and their corruption.  He makes his way to the Pillars, where he meets Ariel’s restless spirit.  She’s the one who lays out for him part of the business about her murder and Nupraptor’s madness, and the threat posed to the world by it all.  Kain is only interested in a cure for his vampirism (now that he’s had his vengeance, he wants no part of this undeath business), but Ariel persuades him that his best bet is to deal with the corruption of the Pillars.  So Kain storms off to go take care of Nupraptor, and ultimately to cleanse the Pillars by severing their connection to their now-insane guardians, solving the problem of their corruption by reference to his sword.  Go with what you know.

It’s at this point that Kain’s personal arc begins to unfold, as he becomes increasingly alienated from humanity, both the species and the concept.  While initially at odds with his vampirism, Kain spends the story coming to grips with the hypocrisy and corruption of human civilization, all the while becoming more and more comfortable with the seeming monstrosity of his new existence.  This is a matter of some necessity.  He has things he needs to do, he has to stay alive to do them, and so a certain amount of blood-drinking and slaughter seems inevitable.  

In his travels, he comes across Vorador’s manor, situated deep in a swamp teeming with monsters.  Kain seeks his help to destroy Malek.  Vorador, for his part, spends the encounter being lordly and largely dismissive of Kain’s quest.  He advises the fledgling vampire that meddling in mortal affairs is nothing but bad news.  Better to sit back and sate one’s hunger – or thirst, in this case – and let the mortal world turn as it will.  Humans are to be preyed on, not helped or manipulated or otherwise gotten involved with.  Best to stay above such passing concerns.  Nevertheless, he takes a liking to Kain, and gives him his ring to summon him at need.

Say a word often enough, and it starts to lose its sense of meaning.  Actions likewise lose significance with repetition.  They become rote.  And as time wears on, Kain seems to begin making a turn.  There’s a certain honesty in being a monster.  You always know what you are, and you always know how other people see you.  Kain may sneer at Vorador’s decadence when they meet, but at least the elder vampire is never less than one hundred percent honest about what he is.

And as Kain goes on, it begins to seem that Vorador was right.  So much of Kain’s and the world’s difficulties seem to stem from the selfishness, greed, shortsightedness, self-absorption, and general malice of the people he runs up against.  Eventually, he winds up accidentally sparking a second genocidal crusade against his own kind.  This has mostly to do with him traveling back in time to kill a man in the past who would grow to become a tyrant in his current era.  This mistake no doubt has its roots in his not having not grown up in a world with a whole sub-genre of fiction concerned with the merits or otherwise of traveling back in time to kill Hitler.

We will have such fun with time travel as the series goes on, let me tell you.

The game ends by offering the player a choice.  Kain’s efforts to cleanse the Pillars and restore balance to the world have made him the new guardian of the Pillar of Balance.  Yet, like all other Pillar Guardians slain at his hand, he himself is corrupt, and must die to complete the task.  So the player is asked: Will Kain willingly sacrifice himself for the greater good of Nosgoth, or will he refuse the sacrifice and choose to live in an increasingly broken and corrupt world.

The sequels take the second ending as canon, and honestly, it’s hard to argue.  This isn’t a story about hope springing eternal, after all.  The few people in it who are unambiguously good are either killed (Ariel) or largely ineffectual (King Ottmar, who comes to prominence briefly toward the end of the story).  The player may feel differently, but there’s little reason to believe that Kain would.  Proud, haughty, vindictive, wrathful, and growing ever more cynical and mistrustful of the motives of those around him, tired of being used as a tool for other’s schemes...  Why would he choose to sacrifice himself?

And so, canonically, we close on a shot of Kain sitting on a throne at the base of the Pillar of Balance, with it and all the other Pillars lying in a broken ruin around him.  He drinks from a goblet, and muses that Vorador was right after all: “Vampires are gods – dark gods – and it is our duty to thin the herd.”

The End.

“Nothing is free.  Not even revenge.”

So that’s Blood Omen as a story.  What about as a game?

On the balance it’s kind of uneven.  

On a technical level, it’s fairly impressive.  In its time, it stood as a testament to the potential quality of two-dimensional graphics in gaming, even as the entire medium was leaping into the third dimension, ready to ditch and decry anything made in 2D as inferior. The result from a technical standpoint is that Blood Omen has in some ways aged better than a lot of other games of its vintage, including its first sequel.  

But then you actually play the thing, and see where it sort of falls apart.

Let’s get the easy part over with, shall we?  The load times in Blood Omen are godawful, just the worst possible combination of long and frequent. It seems almost like a joke at times: “Really?  We’re loading again?  It was one fucking room!”  Were it not for the fact that it began development as a totally unrelated game, I would strongly suspect that the sequel, Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, used its data-streaming technology to avoid loading times altogether purely as a response to this criticism.  I still think that may be the case.

Once we dig past the issue of loading times, though, the game reveals other issues.

There are good ideas on display here.  Let’s start with that.  The game has a day-and-night cycle, and while you can walk around during the day, you deal less damage (and take more) while the sun is up.  Water is like the touch of acid to a vampire, and any time you’re in it, you’ll take constant damage.  Rain and snow will likewise damage you, and while there are power-ups that are supposed to eliminate this problem, I’m not sure they actually work.  At least, not on the PC version of the game, which is what I’ve mostly played.  

The game also requires that Kain drink blood periodically.  His health naturally drains very slowly, but constantly, so you always have to be on the lookout for a way to top yourself off.  There are some more abstract health restoration items, as well as a consumable item you can use, called the Heart of Darkness (this item will become obscenely important in later installments).  However, the game is structured such that most of Kain’s health restoration will have to come from either enemies or, more often, helpless innocents.  This ties nicely into the game’s theme of alienation from humanity, though the way the game often presents these situations –random strangers chained to walls all over the world, for no apparent reason – seems a little odd at times.  And it has interesting ideas about different creatures having blood that might actually be harmful to Kain, or inflict him with a long-term poison.

In addition to the graphics looking nice (the CG cutscenes are definitely of their time, but the in-game sprite work and lighting effects are quite nice), the game has a great soundtrack, dark and moody and ominous. And the voice work is superb.  All character interactions are handled with voiceover rather than on-screen text, and the cast knocks it out of the park.  Not just “good for the mid-90s video game voice acting”, but great, period.

The puzzle-solving is a little lackluster, though.  For something pitched as a “grown-up Legend of Zelda”, its puzzles largely consist of pulling levers and pushing buttons, and navigating mazes. Which is fine, but again, any game that’s going to self-consciously compare itself to The Legend of Zelda needs to bring its A game, especially with its puzzle-solving.

The game does offer you a lot of tools to use, in the form of different weapons, spells, and magical items.  But a lot of these boil down to more inventive yet questionably practical ways to kill enemies.  And considering that setting up a selection of these items for immediate access involves going back and forth to the inventory menu (requiring a load time both ways), it’s easier to just stick with your weapon and a handful of the most commonly used spells and items and call it a day.

Weapons themselves are another problem.  You’ll find that your iron sword from the very beginning of the game is the most generally useful. The mace will let you stun human enemies to drink their blood after just two hits, but it lacks the crowd-control effect of the sword, and also lacks the stunning effect on the non-human enemies that make up the bulk of your later-game foes.  It’s also useful for knocking down certain stone barriers, but these are few and far between, and necessary for progress only very rarely.  The twin axes let Kain cut down trees barring his path, and also let him cut down enemies by spinning like a saw blade… but this means you’ll frequently kill enemies before you have a chance to drain them.  The flaming sword burns enemies alive and leaves only ashes, preventing you from drinking blood that way.  And then the final weapon, the Soul Reaver (also an item of incalculable importance later in the series), deals massive damage as long as you have magic power to fuel it.  But while thus empowered, it detonates the enemies it kills, making them impossible to drain.  And when not empowered, it’s only as damaging as the iron sword, but slower and more awkward.

Combat in general gets frustrating at times, thanks to the iffy hit detection.  One enemy might walk right through your sword swing, while another you could swear was out of range will register a hit.  It never becomes a total deal-breaker, but it’s a point of frequent irritation as you go.

Let’s have another positive: Kain also gains the ability to transform into various other states as the game goes by.  In his wolf form, he can leap over certain obstacles, but his attack in this form has no combo ability and a long wind-up, making him vulnerable.  He can use his bat form to fast-travel between beacons and certain landmark locations, while his mist form allows him to walk on water without taking damage, as well as cross certain barriers without opening the door.  There are also two disguises he can use.  One transforms him into a peasant, while the other turns him into a human-looking version of himself so that he can pass as a nobleman.  The use of both of these is largely situational, required in a very small number of situations and then mostly pointless outside of them.

But perhaps the thing that stands out the most is its linearity.

This is to some extent mandated by the story.  Unlike The Legend of Zelda, to which this game invites much comparison, Blood Omen’s story is very much at all times front and center.  A Zelda game will leave you with bits of story here and there, and largely leave you to explore or puzzle your way forward or dick around in town or otherwise do your own thing for long stretches of time.  The story in one of those games is the starting point of the experience, a backdrop against which you play out the adventure.  Hyrule is to some extent defined by that openness, with its plains and deserts and vast forests and so on.  

Blood Omen lacks this.  Its story is the entire point and purpose of the game. The path forward is always clear and rarely has room for deviation or discovery.  There may be things hidden off to the side, but these tend ultimately to be cul-de-sacs, connecting to nothing else.  This is even subtly expressed in the game’s environments: lots of indoor areas, caves, narrow trails, canyons, and so on.  There’s little opportunity to go off the beaten path.  Blood Omen’s pathways not only discourage exploration, they often disable it. This is not your experience to own; it is Kain’s story for you to be told.

I feel like in story terms, that’s ultimately the difference.  Legend of Zelda’s story always exists to serve the game that Nintendo crafts.  Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain’s game exists to serve the story.

And just to be clear, none of this is bad at all.  It’s every bit as valid in terms of game design and mechanics as any given Zelda.  But if you’re going to compare your game to The Legend of Zelda and then fail to do the most essentially Zelda things in it – not just do them poorly, but not do them at all, missing the point entirely of what a Zelda game is about – then it’s worth commenting on.  I like Blood Omen, but I had to get used to thinking of it on its own terms.  The Zelda comparisons are easy to make. Even without the developers making them, the look and structure of the game seems to invite them.  

Like a good book, Blood Omen is a (mostly) straight shot from start to finish.  Its linearity is what allows it to control the story, to unfold its plot and explore its themes at a pace of its choosing.  The game to some extent revels in its edginess, but to be honest, it was perfect for me at the time.  I was sixteen when I first played the game.  Sixteen, and a bit of a loner with an odd and private (but intense) interest in vampires.  It was probably the perfect game for me at the time.  And it’s still ultimately enjoyable today, if you take it as what it is.  Not as a Legend of Zelda game for adults, but as a decent action-adventure game with a good story and top-notch presentation.  If you don’t mind the linearity and the relentlessly dark and sometimes disturbing story, it’s just about perfect.

Post-script the First: Likelihood of Re-release, and Current Availability

Eeeehhhhhhhhhh...

Here’s the problem: Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain was originally dreamed up and created by Silicon Knights and published by Crystal Dynamics (who also had a hand in the development, late in the process), with distribution to be handled by Activision.  Crystal Dynamics eventually got full ownership of the Legacy of Kain brand, and used it to make the first sequel to Blood Omen, titled Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver.  Silicon Knights was against this, but had less deep pockets than Crystal Dynamics, so they were ultimately the losers of the resulting court battle over the affair.  The lone bone thrown to them was that Crystal Dynamics had to acknowledge in the game that Soul Reaver was based on characters and ideas created by Silicon Knights.

By the time Soul Reaver rolled around, Crystal Dynamics belonged to Eidos.  Then, in 2005 (not long after the last Legacy of Kain game was published), Eidos was completely bought out by Square Enix, and was mostly refocused on creating western-style games under the Square Enix umbrella.  Crystal Dynamics still exists as a division within Square, where they’ve been making various Tomb Raider games almost exclusively ever since the acquisition.

The problem with any hypothetical remaster or re-release of Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain is that, for several years, it would have required some three-way legal wrangling to determine who really owned the thing, and what they could do with it (if anything), and under what conditions.  

As of about 2014, Silicon Knights ceased to exist (about which more later, because it’s a fun story), but that still leaves the rights an open issue.  Square Enix seems to own the larger Legacy of Kain intellectual property, but there’s the question of ownership regarding Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain specifically, and I’m not sure that question has ever been answered.  Silicon Knights doesn’t exist, but many of its personnel are still around in some capacity, and would presumably have something to say about anything involving it.

Venues like Steam and Good Old Games have released the every other installment in the series digitally (even Blood Omen 2), but nobody’s touched the original game.  Probably CD Projekt Red and Valve don’t have much desire to try unsnarling the ownership and licensing issues themselves, and none of the owners seem all that keen on it, either.

And it will probably stay that way.  The Legacy of Kain series in general has always been pretty solidly in the B tier of video games, from back when there still even was much of a B tier in the first place.  The fanbase for that kind of deliberately overwrought gothic supernatural fantasy was loyal, but never very big, and I’m not sure how much that’s changed.  Moreover, I’m not sure either Square is willing to bank on it having grown in the interim enough to do anything about this first game in the series.  The more time goes by, the less inclination any party has to make anything of the series, especially an early entry whose ownership may be contested. An indirect sequel, and also some kind of MMO, were both in the works at various points.  The MMO vanished after not very long at all on the market, and the indirect sequel never made it out of development.

Legal options for playing Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain are limited.  You can play the original PlayStation version on the PlayStation 1, 2, or 3.  It’s also digitally available on the PS3, although not for the PSP or Vita.  Infuriatingly, it’s one of a small handful of games that can’t even be side-loaded (a process that involves downloading a digital PS1 game onto your PS3, then copying it uninstalled to the Vita).  The PC version, meanwhile, can still be played, though there’s a special program custom-made for it that you’ll have to get in order to install it and run it on modern systems.  And this tends to run a little slow.  Music and sound are fine, it’s just the game actually moves slower than normal.  Or you could install a virtual desktop and play it that way.

Post-script the Second: The Death of Chivalry

So whatever happened with Silicon Knights?  

Well, the story is… not complicated, exactly, but not entirely straightforward, either.

Development of Blood Omen was troubled.  As we would later learn, this was not an especially novel situation for Silicon Knights to be in.  Two of their other big projects later on underwent some turbulence in production.  Blood Omen was originally to be created by Silicon Knights and published by Crystal Dynamics.  Later on, after Crystal Dynamics became part of British publisher Eidos, they were able to somehow leverage this connection to strongarm their way into ownership of the overall Legacy of Kain intellectual property.  They used it to make the first sequel to Blood Omen, titled Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver. This had begun life as a brand-new IP (originally titled Shifter), which helps explain some of the tremendous thematic, aesthetic, and design differences between the two games.  

Silicon Knights later maintained that they’d had their own ideas for a potential Blood Omen sequel, but never got around to it, and after Crystal Dynamics started making their own sequels, Silicon Knights lost interst.  I’m not sure how much of that is real and how much is just so much sour grapes.  Anyway, they went off and did their own thing for a while.  They published the survival horror game Eternal Darkness: Sanity’s Requiem for the GameCube, after having signed an exclusivity deal with Nintendo around that time.  It had originally been in development for the N64, but was ultimately moved up to the newer hardware after development delays.  For anyone who’s wondering, Eternal Darkness an excellent game, on the shortlist of must-own GameCube titles, even if you’re not necessarily a fan of survival horror.  It’s not perfect (among other things, you have to beat the game three times to see the true ending), but it does a lot of interesting things.  

They also developed the GameCube remake of Metal Gear Solid (likely under heavy scrutiny and supervision form Konami), dubbed Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes.  Much as I tend to prefer the original version of the game for its restraint (Twin Snakes has a lot of ridiculous high-flying wire-fu maneuvering in its action cutscenes), the remake is worth any Metal Gear fan’s time. Among other things, series creator Hideo Kojima has apparently declared it the canon version of events.  It also saw a re-dubbing of the entire script, since apparently when the original audio was played back at a higher sampling rate, you could hear the traffic in the background, which the ramshackle soundproofing used in the original hadn’t been able to entirely shut out.  The re-dubbed script also has the benefit of having allowing Jennifer Hale and Kim Mai Guest to ditch their put-on accents – Guest’s being particularly irritating, and borderline racist (maybe actually racist; I’m a white dude, and not totally clear on these things).

After this, they moved on to the Xbox 360 with their passion project Too Human, which had been troubled from the beginning.  Its on-again, off-again development cycle spanned a decade and three console generations.  It began development for the original PlayStation, then shifted to the GameCube when the developer did in the early 2000s.  It went quiet for a few years, then resurfaced as an Xbox 360 project that was ultimately delivered in 2008, two years after its projected release on that console.

Too Human was a notorious, news-making flop, and Silicon Knights responded to this failure not simply by pinning the blame on someone else, but by doing that and then actually suing them.  Specifically, they sued Epic Games, from whom they had licensed the Unreal Engine 3 to make the final version of Too Human.  The accusation was that Epic deliberately sabotaged developers who licensed their engine by providing an incomplete product, and that the difficulties stemming from this had caused development delays.  These delays, and the compromises they brought about, were supposedly ultimately responsible for the failure and the financial losses of Too Human.

Epic responded by then counter-suing, which was the beginning of the end for Silicon Knights.

Epic’s counter-suit stated that Unreal Engine 3 was a work in progress, and that they were making it essentially on the fly as they developed the first Gears of War.  The counter-suit further stated that it was readily and openly acknowledged that the engine was unfinished, and that when it was done, it might ultimately not turn out to be useful for the licensees.  Epic’s suit further indicated that these facts were all known and laid out in the licensing contract, and so like all licensees, Silicon Knights knew this when they signed for it.  

But it gets better (which is to say, worse, at least for Silicon Knights). Epic’s counter-suit also included the allegation that Silicon Knights had knowingly and wrongfully copied code wholesale from Unreal Engine 3 and incorporated it into their own engine without permission from Epic.  They had then gone on to use this hybrid engine on other internal projects without the permission of the people they’d cannibalized it from.  

Now, I’m not one to root for a big corporation, even (especially) a game developer.  But Silicon Knights had the misfortune of being run by Denis Dyack, a known con-man, grifter, shady bullshitter, and general ambulatory phallus.  He maybe wasn’t in the same category as a Randy Pitchford or a Bobby Kotick, but that’s less a matter of capacity and more a matter of opportunity.  Given the chance to operate on their scale, I don’t doubt he’d have fit right in with that crowd.  

As far as the court case went, the evidence was overwhelmingly in Epic’s favor. In addition to their own court costs and damages awarded to Epic, Silicon Knights was forced to recall all unsold copies of Too Human and X-Men: Destiny (another game they’d developed with their Unreal Engine 3 hybrid), as well as scrap all projects using the engine, which seems to have been literally everything they had in the works at that point.

So what happened, essentially, is that Silicon Knights sued Epic Games in an effort to offset their losses by making money out of the Too Human debacle somehow, and it backfired so comically that they broke themselves against their opponent.

But their end, one way or another, was probably inevitable in that console generation.  Looking at their release history, there’s really nothing that stands out as a hit or an absolute classic.  Eternal Darkness and Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes were both fine games, this much is true.  But Eternal Darkness was a GameCube exclusive, and the GameCube didn’t sell the way Nintendo hoped.  Meanwhile, The Twin Snakes is certainly nice, but as a remake of a different developer’s game, it has little in the way of originality, and very little of the material can really be said to “belong” to Silicon Knights, since it was someone else’s brainchild right from the start.  

They were never a hugely prolific publisher, with eight games published before they folded, and according to Wikipedia, seven known titles cancelled at various points during their existence.  These cancelled projects included two sequels to Too Human (which had always been planned as a trilogy).  Given the cold reception received by the original, both from critics and consumers alike, that seems questionable.  In for a penny, in for a pound, I guess.  But however you look at it, they didn’t have what you’d call a good ratio of finished to unfinished projects.  And while it’s worth mentioning that many of those unfinished projects were upcoming games they were forced to cancel because they’d been made (or begun) with their illegal Unreal Engine 3 hybrid, the fact is that when your business plan hinges on stealing another developer’s game engine to make your own games, you’re already in a bad place.  

Silicon Knights pretty firmly slotted into the middle tier of video games.  For my money, the middle tier is in some ways the sweet spot.  It’s more high-tech and technically involved than the indie set, yet not so high-budget that developers in it can’t feel free to experiment.  But that middle tier has all but vanished these days. It’s questionable whether Silicon Knights would have hung on long enough to find a spot in it today, even if they hadn’t destroyed themselves going after Epic, just based on the iffy reception of their games.  That’s without considering the general skullduggery it took to keep them going in the first place.  And I also tend to think of X-Men: Destiny as a bad sign.  There’s no shame in work-for-hire; it’s how a lot of major development studios (like Blizzard) started out.  But that’s the key: you start out doing work-for-hire projects to make the money to strike out on your own. Silicon Knights was moving in the opposite direction, and that’s a bad sign.

Vae Victis, indeed.

[scripttorture]

Torture in Fiction: The Dragon Prince

The Dragon Prince is a wonderfully written and beautifully animated cartoon. I don’t usually take on a whole series but I was interested in the pitch and have fond memories of Avatar: The Last Airbender. I was curious to see what the creators had come up with since.

And overall I really enjoyed it. The characters are engaging and the plot is an interesting twist on a lot of typical fantasy tropes. (It also helped that this is the first time I’ve seen an animated character sign.)

The review contains spoilers for the entire season (1) of this cartoon.

After humans started using dark magic, magic drawn from destroying naturally magical creatures, an alliance of elves and dragons drove them to the western side of the continent. In the war that follows humans killed the dragon king and destroyed his egg.

Years later a group of elves sneak into the human kingdom, determined to assassinate the king and his son in revenge. Rayla, the youngest of the assassins, discovers that the egg is intact and alive. With the human princes, Ezran and Callum, she sets out to return the egg, the titular Dragon Prince, to his home.

But once again I’m rating the depiction and use of torture, not the story itself. I’m trying to take into account realism (regardless of fantasy or sci fi elements), presence of any apologist arguments, stereotypes and the narrative treatment of victims and torturers.

Which means I’m not focusing on the main characters or their plot line here. Instead this review is going to focus mostly on three side characters: Runaan, the leader of the elven assassins who kills the human king, Viren, a dark mage and the king’s advisor who takes over the country on the king’s death and Gren a guardsman loyal to Ezran and Callum’s Aunt.

Viren chooses to have Runaan kept alive and imprisons him in a stone cell. He’s chained in a seated position with his hands raised above his head. Viren attempts to bribe and threaten Runaan into revealing information about a magical artifact. Runaan refuses and in retaliation Viren casts a spell imprisoning Runaan’s essence in a coin.

As Viren tries to consolidate power he clashes with the princes’ aunt, a military commander who insists the boys are alive and should be searched for. Viren manipulates her into returning to the front lines but not before she leaves Gren in charge of searching for the missing princes.

Viren has Gren imprisoned. He’s chained in a standing position with his hands kept level with his head.

I’m giving it 2/10

The Good

1) Torture and the threat of torture is used in the context of interrogation but the story shows it failing. Runaan rejects every request for information Viren makes. He also rejects every 'olive branch' Viren extends.

2) Torture isn’t shown changing or even mildly influencing Runaan’s strongly held beliefs. If anything the story shows Runaan’s anti-human stance becoming more entrenched in response to torture.

3) Viren’s motivation for imprisoning and torturing both Runaan and Gren is quite in keeping with reality. Runaan is an enemy soldier. Gren is loyal to the old regime that Viren is actively trying to replace. This makes both of them political enemies, treated as threats to the new regime’s security. That’s incredibly true to life.

4) The timing of Viren’s bribes also felt like a good point to me. Runaan is captured and abused and then Viren attempts to bribe him into cooperation. First he uses food and drink, then he uses the offer of freedom. I don’t know whether it was intentional or not but I liked this element because it supports the notion of Runaan’s opposition becoming firmer as he’s mistreated.

5) I enjoyed Viren’s general characterisation throughout this and the way he justifies his actions. He presents himself as a ‘pragmatist’. He says he’s willing to make the ‘tough choices’ for the good of others and the Kingdom. That’s the kind of torture apologia torturers often parrot.

6) And that view doesn’t go unchallenged in the story. Other characters point out that Viren’s actions mostly benefit himself. His cruelty and his so-called ‘pragmatic’ lack of morals are presented as causing bigger problems than they solve. Together it creates a really good, succinct and understandable portrait of a torturer. It shows him parroting typical torture apologia and it shows why those views are wrong.

The Bad

Both Runaan and Gren should be dead several times over.

The portrayal of stress positions here is frankly appalling. It's difficult to be exactly sure about the passage of time in the story but Runaan is kept with his hands chained above his head for at least a week. Gren is kept standing for days.

Stress positions kill after about 48 hours.

In this case, neither character is depicting as suffering due to the way they're restrained.

Runaan is shown suffering but this is visually and narrative linked to other things. He's bruised because he was beaten when he was captured. His arm is withering due to a curse. He's weak because he's refusing to eat and drink (which should also have killed him, however I’m willing to give that more leeway in a non-human character). But the stress position he's kept in isn't depicted as fundamentally harmful.

This is more or less repeated with Gren. He isn't shown refusing food or drink and he wasn't beaten when captured. His posture in his chains is relaxed. He shows no signs of pain or discomfort. He leans against the wall and whistles. His movement, colouration, coherency and memory all seem to be completely unaffected.

Stress positions are incredibly harmful. They are painful. They cause wide scale break down of muscles in the victim’s body. This initially leads to a build up of fluid in the extremities. Which causes painful, discoloured swelling in the limbs, sometimes to the point that the skin ruptures into blisters. As more muscles are destroyed the protein released into the bloodstream becomes too much for the kidneys to handle and they fail. One description I read described the kidney’s being turned into ‘swiss cheese’.

The result is a protracted, painful death that can occur a significant period of time after the victim is released from the stress position.

The fact that it’s a stress position singled out as a ‘harmless’ torture is extremely significant here.

This is a torture that generally doesn’t leave lasting marks. It’s a torture that’s common in the modern world. And we unfortunately live in a world where torture trials often hinge on the presence or absence of ‘physical proof’.

Scars.

Survivors are regularly dismissed and belittled because they were tortured in ways that didn’t leave obvious marks on their skin. Because their torturers used techniques like stress positions.

Showing these tortures as harmless backs up the societal view that these tortures don’t ‘count’. That the pain these victims experienced was not real and they don’t deserve our help or compassion.

It backs up the notion that these particular victims are to blame for what they suffered.

These aren’t obscure philosophical notions or debates. These tropes, these patterns, these arguments affect our treatment of torture and torture survivors now.

They are part of the social structures that deny torture survivors asylum. They are part of the reason it takes survivors an average of ten years to access specialist treatment.

Presenting these apologist views uncritically to young children isn’t neutral either.

Because even without taking into account parental blockers on internet searches accurate information on torture is incredibly difficult to find. Any curious viewer, of any age, who watches these scenes and searches for more information would come across more torture apologia long before they find research on torture.

Especially as they may not even link what they saw to torture.

A casual viewer would first need to make that link. Then be aware of the term ‘stress position’. Then be aware of the academic journals or niche authors who publish on these topics. And then have access to enough money to pay for those sources.

Some of the sources are not available in translation.

The result is that the overwhelming majority of viewers are likely to accept what they see: that stress positions cause no harm.

These details are small. They don’t get a lot of screen time. They’re unimportant to the plot.

But they are not neutral. They matter.

The way the different ideas at play here interact matters. As does their impact on the real world.

And as a result, despite many good points in the portrayal of torture, I feel like I have to give The Dragon Prince a low score.

Overall

Part of the reason I wanted to review this was to highlight how prevalent torture is in children’s media and how cartoons are often sending out the same misinformation as adult action movies.

The Dragon Prince doesn’t suggest that torture works and it doesn’t justify brutality. But at the same time it’s downplaying the damage torture causes by treating some tortures as essentially harmless. It’s telling that the tortures singled out this way are clean tortures common in the modern day.

The tortures that victims are commonly subject to now, the ones that don’t leave lasting marks, are the ones being singled out as harmless. As not ‘proper’ torture.

The message that only some tortures and only some victims ‘count’ starts young. And the sad thing is the people creating this, writing it and drawing it probably had no idea they were portraying torture when they chose to have characters chained to the wall.

The background knowledge most people have on torture is poor, made up of apologist tropes and rumours and misinformation. But it is so widely accepted that it probably doesn't even occur to most creators to fact-check what they write.

And the result in this case is a wonderfully made cartoon, which includes fantastic representation of disability, of racial diversity and women. While parroting tropes about torture that are actively harmful to victims.

Edit: If creators are not prepared to show the effects of torture then they should not use torture. If those effects are unsuitable for a children’s show then I’m left wondering why they included torture.

Personally, given the level of research these particular creators lavished on other areas, I suspect this was ignorance not malice. 

Disclaimer

[thousandeyesand-one]

Tagged by @naomimakesart

■What are your top 3 favorite houses of Westeros?

HOUSE TARGARYEN. I mean Hello! 👀

HOUSE STARK. The Ice to my favorite fire house!

HOUSE DAYNE. Extremely underrated & unexplored I would love to know more.

■If you could live during one era in GRRM’s universe what era would it be? (Age of Heroes, Valyrian Empire, Conquest of Westeros, Dance of Dragons etc.)

I'd probably be like either a weirwood & live through all of these eras lol or I'd be a child of the forest secretly surviving since dawn age at the isle of faces or something! Coz I can't choose one era 😜

■What is your favorite episode/scene from the Game of Thrones TV series?

Battle of the Bastards, Loot train attack, Tower of Joy, First look at Ser Arthur Dayne 💜 basically every time arya is on screen. But I guess S05E04 holds a special place in my heart that whole episode was about Subtle hints at jon's Parentage/Subtle-mild hints at Jonerys future magical babies/ & had perhaps my most fav scene in the show of dany & Ser Barristan Selmy bonding over Rhaegar! 

"Rhaegar never liked killing, he loved singing."

■What ruler do you think brought about the most change in Westeros, be it good or bad?

Jaehaerys I Targaryen, the Conciliator. Alysanne Targaryen, the Good Queen. I think they were the Obama's of the 7k literally inherited the realm from Maegor who almost crumbled the dynasty & the realm but they rebuilt it to last for two more centuries. While you asked Good & Bad I'd like to mention for 99% of good that Baehaerys did there was 1% of bad done by him too. The Iron Precedent of 101 A.C. that establishes male inheritance over female which single handedly caused DOD, Blackfyre Rebellions & is still a problem! If only Jaehaerys would've listened to Alysanne & made daenerys the heir! Listen to your wives Men! Make it a habit!

■If you could ask GRRM one question what would it be?

In a shitty, patriachial world like Westeros, where it is more than clear that men have build & sustained their kingdoms & legacies through Acts of War or Revenge or Want & Need to secure power. Why are women like Daenerys, Arya & Cersei criticized as would-be Mad or psychotic/Too far gone or Already Mad characters?

■If GRRM could write a short novel/series about one other family or historical time (besides the Targaryens) in his universe what would you want it to be about? (My choice would be Nymeria’s Journey!)

Good choice Naomi!👌

I would like to learn more about The Daynes man House Dayne! They are so peculiar, mysterious & any reader of asoiaf knows theres more to that house that is important for the endgame than what we know! More about this family dating back to the Dawn age & the era of the rule of Kings of Torrentine. More about Ashara Dayne & her eldest brother who is still unnamed what is his name? How did he actually look like if his son has valyrian features? was he a snack just like his younger brother?.. you know.. important questions like those needs to be answered!

■What was your first introduction to ASOIAF/Game of Thrones? Did someone tell you about it, did you see it online or did you come across it at a store/shop?

My cousin told me about the book series but I was busy with my studies at the time so I couldn't pick it up. But then the show happened & he told me about it too so I watched the first season before reading the books. Then I picked up my Jaw from the floor after watching S01 & straight away bought those books. & THAT'S HOW MY LIFE ENDED!

■What’s one thing that bothers you about GRRM’s series?

I think it's the doylism that bothers me. It has always bothered me I am a Tolkien nerd & that man wrote stories beyond human capacity & error. Middle earth is as fantasy as fantasy can be & even though J. R. R Tolkien was inspired to write his stories by the service he did in military during war his story isn't a doylist one, maybe mild references here & there but nothing as serious as asoiaf. I feel like doylism complicates everything in this story! (P.S I also never was much of a history student Biology was Life!)

■What’s one thing you unabashedly love about GRRM’s series?

The impossibly, irrevocably, unattainable & unfair high expectation of men (selective men) that GRRM has created. I mean good luck to myself on getting in a relationship or getting married coz you aint never gonna be Ser Arthur Dayne awesome or Rhaegar Targaryen & Jon Snow Broody, Melancholy sexy!

■What are your feelings about the prequel series in development at HBO right now for the Long Night?

I really really love Bran Stark & how he is connected to the rich 8,000 or longer history of Kings of Winter & the actual nature of this world, all the stuff that predates back to Dawn Age. First Long Night is something I would definitely love to watch, Fingers crossed am sure I'll like it! Also because valyria came into existence right after the First Long Night so this series only gives me hope for a Valyrian Freehold Prequel THAT WHICH I TRULY WANT!

Now tagged by @chillyravenart

Here goes..

■Which Westerosi castle would you like to live in?

Starfall, Dorne. Duh!

■Would you rather be a rich and influential lord, born into wealth and privilege or would you rather be someone who wields power from the sidelines, like Littlefinger?

I'd rather be born rich & influential because I know myself I won't be another cuckoo Lord or lady of the 7k. Plus it seems like anyone like Little Finger or varys who rises from sidelines have to sell their souls to the Satan with zero sense of humanity & everything being a race for power.

■Pick one: platinum hair or purple eyes?

I'll take purple eyes because I have jet black hair & purple eyes just compliment the fuck out of black hairs!

■Based on a tag I made once, based on your physical features, which part of Westeros/which house do you belong to?

In dorne probably House Martell.

■Who do you think will actually defeat the Night King?

I think Bran is the one who is truly going to defeat Night King.

■Three people you think will die in season 8?

Night King, Cersei & Varys. Can I add a fourth? Melisandre too.

■What would you name your dragon/direwolf?

My Dragon would be called Tzarax & my Direwolf would be called Amaris which means Child of the moon. She'd be an albino without red eyes maybe golden eyes!

■How must Ser Pounce be avenged?

Ser Pounce's daughter should train to be a faceless assassin & return all badass with many faces of cats & avenge Ser Pounce roaming around the red keep biting the hell out of anyone because Valar Mewghulis. All Men must be biten.

■Whose POV chapters are your favourite? (If you haven’t read the books... skip this and hang your head in shame lol jk jk jk)

My fav POV chapters are Bran, Dany, Jon, Arya. In that order!

Hang your head in shame lmao👏😂

■Your favourite ASOIAF/GOT antagonist? 

Varys. This dude is going to burn in the seventh hell for all the bs he has unleashed upon just about everyone he has ever come across. I would name LF too but unfortunately it seems Varys outlived him so yeah The Spider & his webs are deadly as they come.

My Questions are:

1. What is that one moment or situation in asoiaf or GOT Tv show that inspires you positively?

2. YOUR ONE TRUE SHIP?

3. What is your favorite, ride or die character? CHOOSE ONE, ONLY ONE!

4. If you were to be the Ruler of Westeros & name Seven fighters to your Kingsguard who would they be? (They can be from the current generation of asoiaf or any fighter from any era, choice is all yours!)

6. Your own House sigil, house color(s) & house words?

5. What are your views about Robert's Rebellion?

7. Which is that one Character you wish had more screen time on the show (or) had a POV in the books?

8. Imagine Red Keep School of Witchcraft & Wizardry, which houses would the sorting hat sort these characters into? { Arya, Jon, Daenerys, Bran, Tyrion, Robb, Jaime, Cersei, Sansa, Rickon, Gendry, Joffery, Margaery, Brienne, Pod, Tormund, Hound, Missandei, Greyworm, Bronn, Sam & Gilly }

9. How do you prefer to watch the Final season? With a partner or spouse / alone by myself with no one to bug me / go to a watch party or bar episode events.

I'm Tagging @chillyravenart @naomimakesart @beautifuloutkasts @drakhus @phoebemaybe @mamadragon-daenerys @blue-roses-and-red-rubbies @northernlights37 @tomakeitbeautifultolive @toaquiprashippar @daenerys1417 @submarinesofpacific @crystalmusezz @ anyone who would like to do this i'd like to know your answers!

10. Nobody knows for sure how this story ends, but what is your ideal end to this story?

[count-demonlord-of-decadence]

Impromptu: Introduction of Power

We’ve officially moved from The Nameless Theater to a operational dance club called P.H.; which secretly stands for Pheasant Humiliation. The move reduces our cleaning and maintenance cost by 47.3% and features a fully functioning kitchen. The clubs owner is my friend and fellow libertine Risa Kawajiri, though running the club will keep her from attending ‘Impromptu’. But before we reveal the minutes of this event, let us first describe the locale as there won’t be time to describe them later; but by no means shall it distract from our tale.

The exterior of P.H. is in no way unique or distinguished from the other buildings in the area. The interior of the first floor is just as interesting as the exterior, save for the excessive use of valour. Upstairs is the VIP room with more valour and six televisions for viewing various sporting events. It is only through an electronically locked door on the ground floor labeled ‘Staff Only’ (as opposed to employees only) one can access to our setting. Follow me as I have an electronic key card that allows access. Follow me into a dimly lit corridor with a thrice turning, ADA certified ramp to another door also electronically locked which the key card opens. On the other side is another door much like one finds in a modern bank allowing passage to one person at a time. This third door requires a five digit PIN unique to each guest; thus preventing undesirables from entering. I have provided one for you (85491), so come along as we enter…

...A brightly lit club with gold plating, mirrors and reclaimed wood wherever possible, bringing the word gaudy to the mind of most who see it. Assuming we entered through the Southwest door, I shall describe the layout desoil from the aforementioned starting point. Immediately to the right is the men’s lavatory, along the West wall is the bar, followed by the buffet. The kitchen is behind the bar. The Northwest corner is the supply room servicing both the kitchen and the stage. The stage is along the North wall with a DJ booth in the Northeast corner. The East wall is a lounge area with couches and tables with a variety of pipes, bongs and hookahs ready for use. In the southeast corner is the women’s restroom, followed by the other entrance with a unisex lavatory in between the two entrances. Their architecture and style differ in no way from the rest of the club. The dance floor was in the middle.

Now let us turn to the night in question. Ah but gentle reader, I must first take a moment to beg of you to prepare your heart and mind for a telling of an adventure most impure. Many of the actions we shall depict will, undoubtedly, displease you. This we know. But there amongst you a few whom this tale will warm to the point of arousal. We cannot guess who amongst you will fall into which category, all we can do is relay the facts as best we can given the details of this evening. Think it of as a buffet, some dishes you’ll like, some you won’t, but you needn’t eat them all. Take what you like and leave the rest for others to decide for themselves.

And now, with no further delay or warnings, we present the minutes of the event called, ‘Impromptu’.

There are 19 (counting your dear narrator who does have a role in this drama) attendees at Impromptu, the first we must mention of course is the ponytailed assassin from Thursday; we never did learn his name. He is naked and locked bent over in a pillory bolted to the stage; facing the lounge area. His feet kept apart by a metal spreader locked around his ankles and locked to the stage. His mouth is held open by a dentist's gag. The second guest we must mention is Ling-Li Chang, mistress of the Purple Dragon Triad. She was dressed in a sailor suit, gagged and cuffed ankles and wrists to a wheelchair. A head restraint was attached to prevent her from turning her head, and support the wire speculum that held her eyes open. She was positioned as close to the stage as possible but ensured she could see the whole stage.

The 17 others were all to play a game. Each would be given a turn to subject ponytail to whatever their dark imaginations could conceive of; but whoever killed him would have to pay a thousand dollars to every guest who didn’t their turn. They drew numbers to determine the order.

We’ll skip the hour or so they spent treating this as an everyday social event, making small talk, sampling the food, making each other’s drinks and get to the examples of how it wasn’t. With that the first number was called. It was Lucas (no surname), built like a UFC middleweight; he’s a veteran member of The Syndicate who participated in the raid on Ling-Li’s villa. His past is a mystery to all, but one could speculate he was an American with military training. Lucas simply struck ponytail about the face 14 or 16 times with his fists. He clearly didn’t hold back.

Next was a woman, short, nearly 100 kg most of which was muscle. She had short hair and wore blue jeans, a grey t shirt and a red flannel shirt over it. She place a cage on his limp prick and began massaging his anus and testes with sensuous oils to encourage an erection impeded by the cage. All the men winced, hissed and/or groaned at the sight. A discussion of whether or not he was capable of preventing an erection was possible and all agreed; not with the technique our heroine used. There was an applause at the end.

Number three was an obese white MtoF transexual who went by the name Luna Turquoise; easily voted best dressed of the evening. Luna made sweet tender love to ponytail. There was a spirited debate among those on the dance floor as to how cruel this was. Sure he was sexually assaulted but he wasn’t maimed or disfigured. Also planted the thought that this would be the most pleasant thing to happen to him seem the worst torture of all. Others took the position that not removing the penis prison was the worst. Let us finish the minutes and you, dear reader, can determine what was the worst single event he suffered.

A Japanese dominatrix, unanimously voted second best dressed of the evening, though her name escapes me, took her turn next. She gave him 50 strokes with a bull pizzle on the buttocks. Nearly 30 of those strokes landed in between his cheeks. Following was Christof Select, attending his first such party. He was welcomed with gentle teasing and gratitude. He showed no signs of first time jitters as he shoved filthy and salted bamboo shoots under ponytail’s finger and toenails. He sipped a pair of manhattans and sang Norse folk songs the entire time.

Thérése (no surname), sixty-two, hailing from the bowls of France. She looks like a skeleton, has no hair, no teeth, a stinking mouth, and ass seamed with scars, it’s hole is of excessively generous diameter. She forced her fetid ass and cunt on to the subject’s mouth, rubs it all over his face. She produces some of the most foul smelling farts and queefs as she does so. Her orgasam is intense and she shouts blasphamies as it happens.

Amir Kusein, dressed in an Armani tuxedo and hold his fourth dirty snowball (Pour irish cream and peppermint schnapps over ice in a medium rocks or old-fashioned glass. Top with milk, stir, and serve in "Old-Fashioned Glass" and no garnish) had been moping the night because he couldn’t bring his dog. There was a lively discussion among the attendees about animal participation during the preamble. Suffice to say they were excluded, and Amir was disappointed. He satisfied himself while dropping teaspoons of boiling peanut oil onto ponytail’s back and buttocks. He ejaculated into the subject’s left ear.

Cammy Williams, a veteran member of The Syndicate who participated in the raid on Ling-Li’s villa. She wore an Alice in Wonderland (animated) cosplay with bunny ears atop her head. She was standing at the buffet feasting on teriyaki shrimp when her number as called. She dashed to the stage, wasted no time and showcased her MI6 training by dislocating his right shoulder and breaking a rib in one ferocious elbow strike. This produced a scream and a puddle of urine from the subject that brought a cheer from the attendees. She then returned to the buffet. No one else had teriyaki shrimp that night.

Viktor (no surname), a veteran member of The Syndicate who participated in the raid on Ling-Li’s villa; and probably the largest man you’ll ever see. He wore a white gym shirt and green gym shorts that hide nothing. When questioned about his lack of shoes he replied he liked the feel of the filth on his feet. Brandishing the third largest member of the night, he sodomized to the direction of those on the dance floor, letting them control the tempo, depth, strength, etc. of his penetrations. He finished by discharging into the crowd. They were delighted.

The woman that followed is best described as actress Constance Zimmer (though it couldn’t possibly be her) cosplaying as Edea from Final Fantasy 8. Notably, she was controversially voted third best dressed at the event. She firmly planted her shoe heel in the subject’s anus and proceeded to use a megaphone to verbally abuse him with every degrading insult and invective she could shout in the time permitted. She had spent the last 19 hours memorizing them in preparation for this moment. Most took this moment to use the restrooms or hit the buffet; unless they wanted teriyaki shrimp.

A man I only ever heard called, and I do beg your pardon for this, Arse Splitter, is 28 years old. He has the look of a satyr; his majestic prick is bent saber fashion, it’s head, or glans, is enormous, it is eight and three eighths inches in circumference and the shaft eight in length. A fine curve to this majestic prick. Sodomized the subject in a manner true to his name. Many of the ladies attending wished to try him out, but learned his leanings were only for men’s asses.

Nina White, a veteran member of The Syndicate who participated in the raid on Ling-Li’s villa. She was dressed as a playboy bunny and had just been spurned by Arse Splitter when her number was called. She found large chunks of ice and used them to break eight bones in his hands. It matters not which ones or in which order it happened. It is enough to say it took considerable effort on her part, three chunks ice and only ended because her time was said to have expired.

Up next was a man who made his living as a professional Dennis Rodman impersonator, dressed in a Yves Saint Laurent wedding dress and had been very bitchy since he didn’t make the top three for best dressed. One by one he used a straight razor to cut off the subject’s toes and shoves them up his ass with a member that also fails to make the top three of the night. He discharged when the tenth toe came back out.

A squat woman dressed as Pennywise the Dancing Clown from Stephen King’s It (2017) viciously fists the subject and beats him with a one pound plastic weight in a crudely drawn sock puppet. In her, fist, is the remote for her vibrating panties. Her orgasam is so intense, so flfilling, she falls. After she falls out of him, he voids  his bowels upon her. She then has a second orgasm more intense and violent than the first. Viktor has to carry her off the stage to the lounge where they fornicate, forever tainting one of the couches.

Next was a muscular 6 foot 3 inch tall, black, MtoF transsexual cosplaying as Juliet from Lollipop Chainsaw. She tries to pull out ten of the subjects teeth with two pair of the filthiest pliers one ever did see, failing to get three. She then holds the subject’s tongue with a pair of the pliers and stabs his tongue with a pair equally filthy screwdrivers, both phillips and flat. when asked she revealed she kept the tools in the bowl of a portable toilet used by the homeless. She doesn’t stay for the orgy that follows these minutes.

The penultimate guest was Heather Camden dressed in a Star Trek TNG engineers uniform, rank Lieutenant Commander. She dumped three table spoons of some caustic powder to his mouth that reacted with the water in his mouth in a very acidic way. It produced some voluptuous gargled screams to which she frigged herself. She howled and appeared in seizure when climaxing. The woman, who’s name I cannot remember though I know she went second, carried Heather off the stage.

Last was me, your narrator gentle reader. I simply stab his six or seven times with an ornate early 18th century German smallsword; taking great care to ensure none of the wounds is fatal. The subject is then freed of his bonds and rushed to a competent emergency room. Our heroes then have an orgy the likes of which I’ll leave to your imaginations based on the information you have now. Though i must confess Viktor, Ms. Pennywise and Thérése had their own private orgy which Ling-Li was made to watch, apart from the main one. When it was over Ling-Li was returned to her corpse decorated villa with the understanding of what happens to those who fuck with The Syndicate.

[razziecat]

Many Happy Returns

So this is a story previously written for Lucrecia but it’s in Hojo’s point of view, and it’s been a while since I posted it, so...Here’s a little something for Hojo week!

Hojo found three things in his lab that he couldn’t abide: A Turk, a crowd, and enough pink balloons to float an airship. Perhaps “crowd” was an exaggeration. Three lab assistants, one fellow scientist, and a bodyguard hardly made an invading horde, did it? One should always aim for accuracy. “What is this intrusion?” Lucrecia turned toward him, smiling. “It was a surprise! For my birthday!” “I see. Well, that explains the tiara.” Lucrecia reached up to adjust the sparkling silver ornament on her head. “Everyone’s a star on their special day, Hojo!” Were they? The thought had never occurred to him. His birthday was just another date on the calendar. More than once it had escaped his notice entirely. This fuss and bother meant an interruption of his plans for the day. “Doctor Crescent, these…decorations…are compromising the integrity of the lab.” He scowled at the flotilla of balloons overhead. Pink was a such a gooey, insipid color. Appropriate only for silly teenage girls, not mature, educated adults. Lucrecia hand-waved his concern. “It will be fine. Everything sensitive to contamination is still locked away, and we’ll clean up thoroughly before we bring it out, won‘t we?” The assistants, eyeing Hojo and shuffling about, nodded vigorously, murmuring a chorus of “Yes, Doctor Crescent, Professor Hojo, sir!” Lucrecia swooped down on him, taking him by the arm and drawing him into the group. “Don’t be a party pooper! Come see the cake!”

“You’ve brought food in here? Really, Doctor, this is completely irregular!” There, on his main lab table (which was covered by a pink paper tablecloth), stood a stemmed crystal cake plate surrounded by bunches of fresh mountain daisies and greenery. Good gods, what if there were insects in those leaves? They could be dealing with an infestation by the end of the day! “Here, look,” Lucrecia said, pulling him closer to the table, “isn’t this the prettiest cake you’ve ever seen? Three layers, with strawberry-custard filling and butter-cream icing! My favorite!” “Refined carbohydrates, mostly sugar,” he sniffed, “certainly nothing nutritious.” That sort of thing would have to stop, once their project was fully underway. He would not risk the health of his subject with junk food. “Oh, pish,” said Lucrecia. “We deserve a treat after all these months of work. Let’s light the candles. And don’t you say a word about live flame in the lab!” A ring of nine pink candles, one or two stuck a bit crookedly in the icing, encircled a mound of crushed strawberries atop the cake. Too few to represent Lucrecia’s actual age, of course, but then, this whole thing was nonsense. “Allow me.” The Turk, perpetual thorn in Hojo’s side, leaned forward with a gold-cased lighter. He glanced at Lucrecia, a tentative smile on his lips, and with quick, efficient motions lit each of the candles. “Go ahead, Doctor Crescent. Make a wish?” A rosy flush colored his face. The glow of candle flame, probably. Make a wish! Superstition! Hojo schooled himself to patience as Lucrecia, laughing, screwed up her eyes, brows furrowed in concentration. Too much to hope for that she wish for something practical like increased funding or better equipment. But then, wishes were claptrap. One achieved one’s goals only through hard work, determination and tenacity. “I’m ready!” Lucrecia opened her eyes, pursed her lips, and blew out the candle flames in a rush, looking ridiculously pleased with herself. “You did it all with one breath,” one of the assistants piped up. “That means you get your wish!” A childish fantasy. Hojo rolled his eyes. At that moment his gaze crossed the Turk’s. Naked longing clashed with disdain, and resentment hissed from between Hojo’s teeth. What was this boy, this common assassin, thinking just now? Did he, would he, dare--? “Come on, Hojo, share a piece of cake with me!” A paper plate was pushed into his hands; he took it by reflex, too distracted by simmering anger to protest. The wedge of white cake, dripping with berries and custard, smelled sickeningly sweet. Lucrecia used a pink plastic fork to snatch a bite. She popped it into her mouth, closing her eyes. “Oh, Vincent, it‘s delicious! Thank you!” That did it. Hojo gently captured her hand, took the fork, and scooped a lump of cake into his own mouth, eyes locked with Lucrecia’s. There, now, THAT was a blush. Ha! The Turk would no longer meet his eyes, which suited Hojo just fine. The arrogant punk needed to be brought down a peg or two, learn to respect boundaries and keep his proper place. Lucrecia gave slices of cake to each of the assistants. Whatever the Turk was sulking about, he didn’t let it keep him from claiming a piece for himself. Well, no matter. The fool would think twice before over-reaching again. The party wound down in short order, cake and decorations tidied away quickly enough to suit even Hojo’s exacting standards. Even the loathsome balloons were removed, much to his relief. Lucrecia kept the tiara, looking like a queen in a lab coat as she shooed away the assistants and her now-subdued bodyguard. “Well, back to work, I suppose!” she sighed. Finally! Hojo cleared his throat. “One moment, Doctor Crescent. I have something--well, come over here.” He turned to the lab refrigerator, where biological samples that needed to stay cool were kept, and took out a small glass vial, its sides opaque with condensation. His hand trembled slightly as he passed the vial to Lucrecia. How strange that he should suddenly be flustered like this. He was a scientist, not some ignorant rube! Lucrecia turned the vial, peering at the translucent green liquid inside. It cast an iridescent glow, veiling her face in crystalline light. “Hojo! Is this…?” He straightened his shoulders. “Yes. It’s the beginning of our ultimate success. A distillate of Jenova cells, suspended in mako. You might call it essence of the Ancients.” She examined it critically, as though she could measure its purity by eyesight alone. “It’s stable?” “It is. I performed every test multiple times.” “So that’s why you’ve been working late every night! I thought you were avoiding me!” “Nothing of the sort.” Damn it, this was unaccountably awkward, but he must forge ahead. Would he let a simple thug of a Turk upstage him? “I wanted to have it ready to present to you today. As a gift.” The smile that bloomed on her face made every sleepless night worthwhile. “Oh, Hojo, that’s so sweet! Gaia, I can’t believe it’s ready. All that work, contained in this small vessel.” It was impressive, if he did say so himself. Thousands of years had passed since the last Cetra had died, and he, Hojo, had revived the cells of the only specimen they’d ever found. Her cells had proved far more resilient than he’d dared to hope, and combined with mako, with all its wondrous properties…well, what couldn’t they accomplish? Future generations would hold their names in awe. This would be a coup of science, the like of which the world had never seen. Lucrecia twirled the vial in her fingers, throwing shards of light like a kaleidoscope. “Well, now that we’ve got the means…” She glanced up at him, eyes crinkling, mouth shaping a teasing curve. “We’d better get on with the next step of the, um….procedure.” Blood rushed to his face, and quickly left for parts farther south. “Here and now?” Laughing, she took his hand. “No time like the present!” Her excitement was contagious, and he’d earned it fairly, hadn’t he? Nothing so pedestrian as flowers and sweets, or cheap decorations, his gift spoke of true dedication. Not to an ideal, but to something unique--a tangible miracle. He had a room nearby, a bed made up for those nights when he needed to stay close to a delicate experiment. How appropriate, to consummate the union of intellect and passion here, where it would all come to dazzling fruition. They left the silver tiara on the lab table, its glitter dulled in the pale morning light.

[aion-rsa]

How to Write a Good Fantasy Ensemble, with Victoria Aveyard

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Writing compelling characters can be one of the most difficult parts of the craft, especially when it comes to ensemble stories, which focus on groups of characters and their relationships with one another. In an ensemble story, each character needs their own desires and roots, their own challenges and voice. At their best, reading a good ensemble story can feel like hanging out with a clever, loving, bickering group of friends. It’s one of the reasons we love The Lord of the Rings or Six of Crows or The Expanse. It’s also one of the reasons why fantasy author Victoria Aveyard wanted to write her new book, Realm Breaker. Inspired by her childhood love for The Lord of the Rings, Aveyard wanted to write a proper high fantasy adventure that had a place for her in the ensemble.

“It’s no secret Realm Breaker was written to comfort my 14-year-old self, who wanted so desperately to be part of the Fellowship,” Aveyard tells Den of Geek ahead of Realm Breaker‘s May 4th release. “But I’m not a straight white guy, so the Fellowship didn’t have room for me. I tried to keep that in mind, and remember how badly it felt to be excluded by something I cared about so much. With Realm Breaker, I hoped to give a little more space and possibility to the concept of a classic fantasy hero, and an adventurous quest.”

Aveyard is best known known for her Red Queen YA fantasy series, which won the 2015 Goodreads Choice Award for Debut Goodreads Author. Her newest fantasy novel, Realm Breaker, introduces a world of ancient lineages and immortal warriors. In as much as there is a main character, we have Corayne, a pirate’s daughter eager to leave her shore-bound existence. With a magical army set to ravage her world, she finds herself on a quest to make things right. 

As the protagonist around which the ensemble revolves, Corayne was the center of the story, but Aveyard always imagined it as an ensemble piece. Aveyard also says she wanted Corayne to be different from the protagonists of the stories she loved when she was young. “I went into Realm Breaker absolutely knowing that my main character and leader would be this teenage girl, the bastard daughter of a hero who wants no part of him,” she says in our email interview. “So Corayne’s parameters were in my head early on, but I also absolutely knew she would be part of an ensemble team of deadly misfits. Obviously, Corayne is the core and emotional anchor.”

Of course, the field of fantasy has changed a lot since The Lord of the Rings was published in 1954, or even since its latest pop culture renaissance brought on by the movie trilogy in the early naughts. N.K. Jemisin, Kameron Hurley, A.K. Larkwood and many others have set out to do the same thing—to represent people like themselves in fantasy fiction—and succeeded. In the introduction to Realm Breaker, Aveyard expands on this somewhat, saying:  “I struggled to find my own self in their pages and imagery. And if someone like me, a straight white girl, is struggling, how must others feel? I remember turning to fanfiction to feed the hunger for more, for myself.” 

And in that classic fanfiction way, Realm Breaker doesn’t just take the tenets of its source material as gospel. “I also wanted to run in the other direction a little,” Aveyard says. “The Fellowship are, for the most part, all morally pointed in the same direction. Only Boromir really delves into any emotional complexity and failure, and we lose him early on. I wanted people who were very much flawed and real, who make mistakes or live morally gray lives, who do not believe themselves to be heroes or want to be heroes, but must become them anyways. As for the villain, I like to think of him as an Evil Aragorn, which was a joy to write.”

In Realm Breaker, that complexity means heroes who have already failed, an assassin who finds herself wondering whether the quest is worth fighting for more than money, and more. “I did my best to make each character stand on their own as a person,” Aveyard says, “and therefore act as a person in their situation, with their particular background, would. I stayed as true to their established characters as possible, which makes for a lot of great conflict between very different people set towards the same goal. And I didn’t want to sanitize or force development. It’s a very organic process, growing these people together and making sure they feel real.”

Different chapters have different point-of-view characters, allowing the reader to have knowledge not all the characters share. “The challenge in any story with multiple points of view is making sure each voice sounds different and distinct,” Aveyard says. “Luckily, these characters have such different personalities, that wasn’t as difficult as I anticipated. What helped most was internalizing as much as I could about these characters and their internal compasses, so I didn’t have to be so conscious of their characters while writing their POVs. It’s easier to flow when you don’t have to constantly think NOW WHAT WOULD THEY DO HERE, because you’ve absorbed them and their way of thinking. You already know how they’d react.” 

The finale, when all the work she put into those characters comes together into an ensemble battle, was one of the most fun aspects of writing a large group, Aveyard says. “I had a blast with the set pieces, particularly the climax at an oasis village. It felt like a real payoff of all the set up and development. I can let all these people out of their cages and let them really fight. Not to mention, there’s a moment where Corayne essentially gets passed between all the warriors like some football, to get her safely to her destination. It was a delight for me to visualize the whole sequence, and get it down on paper.” 

Some points of view reveal the lineages of the immortal Elders, for example, or the court of a queen determined to hold on to her power while forced to marry for politics. Aveyard says she enjoyed creating the world from the ground up, especially “fleshing out the edges.” 

“Making those sharply drawn out pieces blend together. And everything builds on something else, creating a framework that is really solid and makes this fictional world feel all the more real, at least to me. I really adore mapmaking, and have since I was a kid, and I would argue a map is one of the most important things in creating a fantasy world that feels real and functional. Geography is probably the most influential thing on a society, so you need that as a foundation.”

Now that she’s writing a novel, that predilection comes in handy in the writerly equivalent, as well. Different novelists have many different methods for organizing their world-building, from personal wikis to sticky notes.

“I draft in Scrivener,” Aveyard says, “which makes it really easy to keep all my research and worldbuilding information in the same window as my draft. But I use lots of lists and charts, along with some excel sheets, to keep all my characters and information organized. I do try to internalize as much as possible, so I’m not constantly referencing. That way I don’t have to break stride in story.”

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So, how do you write a good fantasy ensemble? Aveyard shows how keeping organized, writing what you want to read, knowing your own characters well, and setting one character as an emotional anchor for the rest are part of her process. See how the result fares in Realm Breaker.

Realm Breaker hits the selves on May 4th. It is now available for pre-order.

The post How to Write a Good Fantasy Ensemble, with Victoria Aveyard appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[thatkrazymann]

Throw a Watching to your Witcher.

So it has come to pass, another Netflix Drama series: The Witcher. For those unfamiliar, this new venture comes courtesy of one Andrzej Sapkowski, a polish writer best known for (drum roll please…) The Witcher series! The Witcher is a kind of dark fantasy series, like Lord of the Rings if it caught a venereal disease from a prostitute and also had an old, nagging injury from some old battle, like say, an arrow to the knee? The Witcher follows the adventures, or misadventures, of one Geralt of Rivia, a Witcher, as he travels the lands seeking to just live his life and do what he can to survive. If you are unfamiliar, a Witcher is a monster hunter, not a witch hunter, who has extraordinary abilities that have been granted to them via a forced mutation, they’ve basically been created to be roam the lands and kill various monstrosities for coin. But let’s get to the point, is Netflix’s The Witcher any good? I have played one of the games, read the books, seen the show(which apparently not all reviewers could be bothered to do but hey, why bother to fully work on something you’re paid for right?!) and after consuming all that media, I can’t say I’m totally a fan, but I can say that the show does indeed make for an entertaining watch for newcomers, and it’s at least better than season 8 of Game of Thrones so there’s a win right there.

As I have said, I’m not a devoted fan of The Witcher, I played the Witcher 3: The Wild Hunt, I couldn’t really play the others because I don’t have a PC. I was interested in reading the books after playing the game and found them intriguing and a nice change of place. But with both the game and the books, I found myself really searching for a starting point which didn’t really exist. The show does actually have a much stronger jumping off point, giving the viewer a good baseline for the series to continuously build around. That’s not to say that it doesn’t have some issues and problems, especially to a newcomer I’m sure. There were plenty of times where I took a trip to the wiki page for clarification or to just understand what some character had said that everyone seemed to think was important, and there are still things that I’m not sure the significance of. The Witcher does succeed at doing some pretty good world building, the monsters and magic system are especially well thought out, though a little hard to grasp. But you can really see that care has gone into this series, the team behind the camera, and indeed the team in front of the camera, really do care about this world and the story that is being told, which is rare for a Netflix series I feel.

*Spoiler town ahead so if you want to know what I feel overall, jump to the end!* 

If we want to talk gripes, I have a few but let’s start positive first, this is a rich story! There are so many things going on and multiple layers (like an onion) and the show really doesn’t stumble over itself too badly. A few things that did trip me up was the beginning of Yennefer’s story, why she sucked and then didn’t suck with magic, the girls who turned into eels for what feels like a test, etc. There were some minor quibbles but as the story progressed the true depth of each of the characters shone though. Now, acting wise, I didn’t think I would like Henry Cavill as Geralt of Rivia, I can’t really tell you why, I guess because I just couldn’t see his face as a Geralt but he has a strong opening performance that only gets better the more we see him. Henry is obviously the actor that has read the books beforehand and absolutely loves them, and that pays dividends. I’m not sure if he did all his own fight choreography but man, it looks like he did and during those moments his love for the character shines through in the most minute of details. While I don’t see the same love for their characters as I do from Henry, Anya Chalotra’s portrayal of Yenefer is amazing. The fact that she manages to play Yenefer with a literal crookedness about her before casting that aside shows just how great she is. Anya does a great job owning many of her scenes but I feel like the character kind of stopped getting understandable character development after she met Geralt and her actions become increasingly more contrived. The side actors are all pretty decent, some kind of phone it in, knowing they’re in a fantasy setting where they can say “fuck” repeatedly and not have it seem out of place, while some play to their strengths and deliver really good nuanced performances, although the Ciri storyline has got to be up there for most useless storyline around. Hardly anything answered and really not much gained besides having her occasionally see that everyone sucks in the “real” world.

A weird but for me, ultimately pretty charming aspect of the series that may or may not be a deal breaker for you is the fact that the whole series is told a little out of order. It’s not as tricky to follow as Westworld, but it does make you do some work, and you know what? That’s fine! Working to discover something is kind of a nice feeling, especially when your guesses come true, even halfway so. It doesn’t block everything off behind this grand, final reveal , it just feels a little odd to be seeing events and have characters refer to passages of time in large blocks. The Witcher also succeeds in this by making sure that if you didn’t pick up on some or all of the hints, you don’t feel like a dummy, something which Westworld had no shame beating into me. I certainly think it could’ve been a little more complex with its narrative structure and I know a large group of reviewers and viewers will moan about how it’s unnecessary and that they just want to watch something and turn their mind off and enjoy but you know what? Art isn’t an anesthetic, it’s not supposed to lull you in and put you asleep, it’s supposed to tell something that gets your brain jogging, and while this isn’t a jog, it is a brisk pace for the brain.

Now, time for some proper looking at what may not in fact be too great with The Witcher series and there are certainly a couple things. As I previously said, the Ciri storyline feels very superfluous to me. We don’t learn much beyond the fact that she’s some kind of kid who harbours ancient, primal, magic, which sounds cool until you realize that there’s no payoff for that. Shit never goes down. Sure, Ciri screams and trees blow down, stuff happens but it doesn’t affect the world, I don’t care about that as much as I feel like I should. The Ciri storyline I feel could’ve been saved for the opener of the next season, to show and fill us in on what happened to her between the beginning and end of the first season, then you can throw away as many characters as you want. Dragging her story out without any payoff feels incredibly lacklustre. Another problems is in fact something that I did touch on as saying it was good, the side characters. While the acting involved is good for the most part, I don’t find myself caring about any of them Sure, a couple of them are good and memorable, but on the whole? They all feel like they don’t serve a grander purpose. Whenever characters reappear, they still haven’t changed much and it feels like using them to hide little bits into the hidden narrative layer would’ve been the way to go. The exception to this is Jaskier, who is always brilliant but also helps to give us, the viewer, a character we can relate with who actually does things in this world that change and affect others. It’s disappointing that even my favourite side characters for their amazing acting, like Stregobor, Tissaia, Mousesack, and Calanthe, never really bring something into the fold that I feel gives weight to the narrative, which brings us to my final complaint. The story feels a little dry and meandering, and while that can be acceptable for some episodes and others do help give a better view of the narrative, the episodes toward the end just really bumble about. Geralt hunting monsters or interacting with royalty is interesting and telling, watching Geralt have some kind of fever dream not so much, even if the fever dream is very emotional. Same with Yenefer, when she’s learning magic and fighting off assassin’s and interacting with Geralt? A+, good going, conversely, whining about wanting a choice that SHE made and saying she wants to take it back because she was forced to make it? Not so much. Worse than that, she goes on to protect what she wants to burn down for really no reason that I can gather. Things are interesting but also tedious with her and the world she inhabits.

So, at the end of all this, what are my feelings on the show? Should you watch it? YES! Absolutely. There’re only a couple things issues and they’re all pretty minor in comparison to other shows. The writing and pacing is a little sporadic and while the acting on the whole is good, with the except that some of the minor actors phone it in so they can say “fuck” in the same sentence as saying “the elves” or “butcher of Blaviken”, then you’ll be fine. Sure, a lot of those characters have weird motives or no motives and people bitch and complain about things that I really don’t think is relevant but that’s fine. My two biggest gripes are with a lot of the characters just being absolutely unlikable for the sake nothing or something I don’t understand, even after delving into the wiki, and the Ciri plot which could’ve been touched upon in the season 2 premier and it would’ve had more weight. The acting is fairly rock solid with notable love going out for Henry Cavill, Anya Chalotra, Joey Batey, and Anna Shaffer. The fight choreography is some of the best I’ve seen and I really hope some kind of behind the scenes look at that is shown. So, all-in-all, I’d say a 7/10 to 7.5/10, and since a lot of people will generally think that’s bad, I’ll add this: I’m definitely gonna rewatch The Witcher, probably 2 more times (despite the “Netflix drama time commitment”) and I don’t think I’ll be bored or won’t enjoy myself! Give it a watch and let me know what you think!